Querencia
by king-caboodle
Summary: Querencia: a place where one feels safe, a place from which one's strength is drawn, a place where one feels at home. Hawke finds her home in Varric at the edge of the end of the world. Now if only she could find the strength to stay there. (Formerly known as Saudade!)
1. I: Prolonged Protection

Cole has been watching Varric while he writes. And, Maker, does Varric write. Notes left for Josephine to be discussed at the War Table, memos to himself scribbled in quiet moments at camp, scattered pages of manuscripts stuffed into his pack. Varric writes enough for the entire Inquisition, always effortlessly and without a second thought, and Cole has seen it all. He has seen the way that Varric's letters have served to calm people down, just like his spoken words, causing the fear to fade even in the darkest of times. All without even the air of trying. Without any indication of a concentrated effort to maintain the peace.

But after Varric speaks with the Inquisitor, Cole feels the shift, subtle as it may be. Something is different. He watches as the Dwarf sits at one of the few quiet tables in the Herald's Rest, smoothing out the parchment in front of him. For a moment, Varric stares down at the blank sheets, as though he is waiting for some sort of signal as to what he should say. When no such sign appears, he sets to work, moving slower than Cole has ever seen him move before. The strokes of his pen are careful, deliberate, as he writes, and his eyebrows furrow slightly as he pauses to blow on the drying ink, his eyes skimming over the first few lines.

"You don't want her to worry."

Though he should be accustomed to it by now, Varric jumps slightly at the intrusion. Cole stands over him, his pale blue eyes as wide and unblinking as ever. It is only when Varric motions to the empty chair on the other side of the table, does he sit. "Worrying is what she does best, Kid." He replies, taking another look at what he's written. "I'm just providing a little perspective."

Cole stares at him, the shadow from the wide brim of his hat making him appear more gaunt and ghost-like in the dim light of the tavern. Finally, he speaks. "A fistful of letters. Breathless, jumping onto the bed. 'Feynriel made it to the Dalish! And Lia wants to be a guardsman!' Her eyes so bright, full of sunshine. 'Varric, read them!' Papers shoved into my hands. Warm from her touch." Cole frowns, cocking his head slightly to the side. "But she was happy about the letters when she opened them. Why did talking about them make her sad?"

Varric finds himself taken back to that morning at the Hanged Man, his body yearning for the familiar pressure of Hawke's weight thrown on top of him. He can almost feel it - her legs threaded through his, chin resting on his chest as she reads him the letters again and again, wandering fingers combing absently through his hair. He can see the spark in her eyes that had gone out when they had been forced to hand Sunshine over to the Wardens, see the moment that it flickers as she sits up suddenly, clutching the letters to her chest. "Varric, if Feynriel is having these nightmares - what if the Dalish send him away? He said that they're afraid of him. What if the Templars find him? You don't think the Dalish would turn him in to the Templars, do you?" Her voice is high with panic, and he hears himself fumbling for answers that he doesn't have. He hears her voice, the small one reserved for early-mornings, broken with sobs. "I thought I was helping, Varric. What do I do?"

He hears Cole's voice from somewhere far from Kirkwall. "Light fading. Maker, bring it back. 'Come on, Io, don't cry. You know I can't stand to see a human cry.'"

Varric clears his throat, waving his hand as though the motion would wave the memory away. "Like I said, Kid," He reminds himself that the world as they know it is at stake. "I'm putting things in perspective. Sometimes Hawke gets carried away. I mean, you heard what we did to Kirkwall." He chuckles to himself, shaking his head. "She just needs a," he thinks about it. "A gentle start."

But as the thought leaves his mouth, he knows that it doesn't sound quite right. Hawke's introduction to Kirkwall had been anything but gentle. Every mess they had gotten themselves into had barged in like Isabella after too many drinks down at the tavern - loud and taking no prisoners. He had watched Hawke lose what little family she had left, had watched as she did her damndest to defend a city that had only served to replace the home she left behind. He just couldn't see the point in throwing her into this whole mess without any warning. Not if he could do something to soften the blow.

Rubbing his head, Varric picks up his pen, twisting it in his hand as he decides that the first few sentences are fine how they are. He can feel Cole's stare as he resumes his writing, the boy's eyes following every curve of every letter. "She doesn't like it when you try to protect her." He says, his voice floating through the scent of Kirkwall nights and the sound of Hawke's voice in Varric's ears.

"I know, Kid." He mutters, crumpling the half-finished letter. "I know."


	2. II: The Bitter Taste of Nostalgia

His letter arrives on a Tuesday morning, and by the time the sun begins to sink into the sky, Hawke is on the road to Skyhold. Her heart does not sing with the girlish excitement that she had expected to feel at the thought of a reunion with a certain fine Dwarven craft. There are no butterflies to be found within her stomach. There is no gentle tune playing inside of her head. She is not a woman in love. She is a poison, her ears full only of the sound of her own angry blood pulsing through her veins.

Absently, she toys with the pouch at her hip where she had put Varric's letter - or rather, what little scraps she hadn't thrown into the fire. _An undead magister up and walking around and he insists on writing to the frightened girl from the Hanged Man._ Her hands tighten around the purse, the parchment crinkling weakly in protest. _Cry in front of someone once, twice, or seven times, and suddenly you've got the mental constitution of a coddled child._ She spits, glaring at the empty road ahead. "I killed that moldy bastard once, and I'll do it again!" She says loudly, her fists clenched tightly at her sides.

With her words bouncing off of the trees, she feels her face begin to relax; the uncharacteristically-deep frown slowly unknitting itself from her brow. If only dealing with Corypheus was to be the most difficult part of this journey. The magister, Alistair's suspicions about the Wardens, the possibility of another Blight ravaging a still-recovering Ferelden - these were all things that paled in comparison to the thought of facing _him._ Especially after that damned letter. That softly-worded, gently-nudging letter. The written equivalent of lying in the safety of his arms after a night of brawling with Lowtown's best and brightest, his confident fingers tracing poetry into the curvature of her spine.

Hawke's jaw tightens. After their last meeting, she had assumed that she had lost the right to such careful handling. It had been her fault, after all. It was always something. She was careless with her words; she had always been. Always ready with a flippant comment, a snarky remark that would relieve her of the responsibility of an emotional response. Anything to deprive herself the burden of dealing with the consequences of feeling.

But sometimes it wasn't enough, and it wasn't long before things got messy.

Idly, she brushes her fingertips along the pouch. It had all started off with a letter, hadn't it? Something that she should not have seen but decided to read anyway. Mirthlessly, she laughs - a harsh, barking sound that is foreign in her own ears. It wasn't as though she had been surprised. Not by the letter, anyway. How many years had she fooled herself - how many years spent willfully ignorant, pretending that things were the pinnacle of perfection? Pretending that it was just a name for his crossbow, an affectionate moniker for a treasured weapon. She shakes her head as the bile begins to rise in her throat - a particularly bitter nostalgia that she is not prepared to deal with tonight.

Hawke walks until her legs are ready to give out, until every joint in her body is screaming out for even the briefest moments of relief. She sets up camp in a clearing off of the path, sinking down into the earth half-wishing that she could be swallowed up by it. She tries to clear her mind, tries to give her brain the same rest as her body, but her thoughts wander back to the letter in her pouch. Io. She was almost never Io. At least, not to other people. To Bethany, she was "sis." Mother had always called her darling. Gamlen used to call her sweetie, but she doubted that was genuine. More often than not, Hawke was simply Hawke.

And yet he had written it clear as day. Io. She was only Io when they had slipped up the stairs to his room in the Hanged Man, while the others were focused on their game of Wicked Grace. She was Io in the early morning light, his voice thick with sleep but his wandering hands already very much awake. She was Io when she cried, a gentle murmur against the skin of her scalp, her tears running down his shoulder into the thicket of his chest hair.

And now she was Io in a letter she didn't deserve, written in a tone that was far too gentle to follow a fight that she had started.

Hawke presses the heels of her palms into her eyes until she can see stars. _You're going for the Inquisitor._ She reminds herself. _For the fate of the world_. Lying spread-eagle on the ground, she repeats the thoughts in her head until they bleed together in a meaningless mélange of diction. She remembers telling someone - that Templar's sister - that killing people and helping people was what she did best, but something told her that she was going to have to add a healthy dose of professionalism to that list if she was going to make it through this ordeal. _Aveline would've known what to do_. She thinks, trying to imagine what Aveline would've done in this situation. If there was anyone who knew professionalism, it was Aveline. _Although,_ she frowns. _I had to fight through hoards of highwaymen and a pack of Mabari just so she could_ speak _to Donnick._

Remembering Aveline's own undoing at the hands of a man is enough to make Hawke groan. "This is absolutely _hopeless_!" She cries, banging one fist against the earth in exasperation.

Throwing an arm over her eyes, Hawke sighs, repeating her new mantra to herself. After a moment or two, the words begin to have a calming effect - potentially combining with a lifetime's worth of emotional exhaustion and the day's exertion. Slowly, her thoughts begin to even out, growing hazy as she becomes more in tune with the silence around her. The last thing she thinks of before she dozes off is the strange tugging at her heart, and the image of a pale boy with a wide-brimmed hat who, oddly enough, feels like home.


	3. III: Rooftop Rendezvous

Hawke had never been one for brevity, but she manages to pull off an uncharacteristic brusqueness in her fashionably late response to Varric's letter:

 _Arriving in two days. Make the necessary preparations_. Sent off without so much as a signature.

In the two days it takes her to arrive at Skyhold, she continues to remind herself of the mission at hand. _Stop Corypheus, find the Wardens. Stop Corypheus, find the Wardens._ She mumbles the objective to herself as she makes her way down the bridge leading to Skyhold's front gates.

"Serah Hawke," she is greeted by a Scout at the threshold. "Varric said that we should expect you."

"Stop Corypheus, find the Wardens." The words fly out of Hawke's mouth before she can stop them, and she flushes with embarrassment. The Scout looks at her blankly, and Hawke shakes her head. "I – I didn't – yes, well then," she clears her throat. "I'm here now. Where may I find," she pauses. "Where am I expected?"

"He's on the battlements with the Inquisitor." The Scout nods in the direction of the courtyard. "If you would follow me."

As they lead her through the gates, Hawke whistles in awe. Skyhold is certainly something to behold, an independent city-state in its own right. It certainly has the fortifications for it, at least. They stop a stone's throw away from another set of stairs, and Hawke can hear Varric's voice floating up from somewhere below.

"I take it this is my stop?" The Scout returns the question with another blank look. "Well," Hawke fidgets. "I'll just be going then. Thank you for your–"

Before she can finish, the Scout nods curtly and sets off in the opposite direction. _Maybe the Inquisitor isn't too keen on visitors_. She thinks idly. Taking a deep breath, she turns and pauses at the head of the step. _Remember, Io, stop Corypheus and find the Wardens. Anything else is just an unneeded distraction._ However, as she sets down the stairs and manages to catch Varric's eye before she can even step onto the landing, Hawke realizes that writing everything else off as a distraction is easier said than done.

"Inquisitor, meet Hawke." a smile plays on his lips. A smile that hits her harder than any Coterie thug could ever hope to. "The Champion of Kirkwall."

Varric's voice drips with a sense of pride and affection that Hawke cannot even begin to process. A week's worth of carefully-hoarded rage immediately dissipates at the warm sound of his voice, and for a moment she can't remember what she's doing here. Every instinct in her body screams for her to charge toward him, to shower him in kisses and needless apologies until her lips are bruised and her tongue is weary. Absently, her fingers twitch at her side, already yearning to tangle themselves in his hair, pulling and twisting as that _wicked_ mouth trails kisses along the insides of her thighs. The thought is so enticing that she almost audibly groans. _No._ Hawke bites down on the inside of her cheek in an attempt to draw herself back into reality. _No, these are only distractions_.

Fighting through her gooey thoughts, she regains her composure. "Though," _remember why you're here._ She scowls darkly in his direction, her voice full of deathroot. "I don't use that title much anymore."

If Varric is taken aback by the sudden burst of animosity, he hides it well, choosing instead to beckon the Inquisitor over. "Hawke," he begins, planting himself in between them. "Meet the Inquisitor. I figured you might have some friendly advice about Corypheus." He glances up at her, another grin on his face. "You and I did fight him, after all."

It takes all of her willpower, but Hawke ignores him, turning her full attention to the Inquisitor as they look out into the courtyard. The Inquisitor is not what she had expected – though, people in these situations rarely tended to be. She is an Elf – Dalish, by the look of it – with comically-large ears and wide eyes the color of bloodstones. Hearing the stories, Hawke had imagined a titan of a woman. Perhaps even a golem, with the way that she had apparently muscled her way through the Ferelden countryside. But Inquisitor Lavellan is barely taller than Varric, with a body that (much like Hawke's own) gave the impression that it was better suited for consuming baked goods rather than fighting off demons. Even her face radiated the warmth and kindness that Hawke had typically seen in friendly bakers. For a minute, Hawke misses Merrill terribly.

"You've already dropped half a mountain on the bastard." She says flatly, recalling the Inquisitor's dashing escape from Haven. "I'm sure anything I can tell you pales in comparison."

Lavellan shrugs, hugging her arms around herself. "Oh, I don't know. You did save a city from a hoard of rampaging Qunari." Her eyes are aglow, and Hawke briefly wonders what exaggerations Varric has been feeding her.

"I don't see how that really applies." She mutters, running her hand over the smooth surface of her scalp. "Or is there a hoard of rampaging Qunari I don't know about?" Her tone is more venomous than she means it to be, but there is something incredibly irritating about the reminder that she will be little else than a fable sprouted off by a particularly mouthy Dwarf. Competition is one thing, but how can one live up to the embellishments of one's own character?

If Lavellan is put off by her sourness, however, she doesn't let it show. "There is _a_ Qunari. He almost qualifies as a hoard all by himself." She grins her lopsided grin and throws Hawke a wink. "Fortunately, he's on our side."

Hawke stares at Lavellan's bright eyes, and wonders for a moment if she had ever been that genuinely optimistic. She remembers the last time she can recall feeling so full of hope. Setting off with Bethany on their Deep Roads expedition. Right before things had gone from bad to worse. Her heart softens, and Hawke sighs, resting her weight on her elbows. "So then," she says finally. "What can I tell you?"

"Varric says that you fought Corypheus before." She gestures in Varric's direction.

Hawke doesn't turn, her eyes remaining cemented to the Inquisitor as she nods. "Fought and killed. The Grey Wardens were holding him, and he somehow used his connection to the darkspawn to influence them."

"Corypheus got into their heads." Varric speaks up, making his way back into the conversation. "Messed with their minds. Turned them against each other."

Hawke feels a surge of irritation, and she continues loudly over Varric. "If the Wardens have disappeared, they could have fallen under his control again."

The Inquisitor runs her finger along her plump lower lip, appearing to be in deep thought. "So Corypheus has the Red Templars, the Venatori, and now possibly the Wardens as well?" Hawke prepares herself for a stoic response, but instead watches as another grin splits Lavellan's face. "Wonderful."

She feels herself offering a gentle smile in return. "I didn't come this far just to give you bad news." She says slowly, in what she hopes is a reassuring tone. "I've got a friend in the Wardens. He was investigating something unrelated for me. His name is Alistair." Hawke shifts her weight from one foot to the other. "The last time we spoke, he was worried about corruption in the Warden ranks. Since then, nothing."

Varric's hand skims her arm, causing her to jump. "Corypheus would certainly qualify as corruption in the ranks." He says gravely, eyebrows furrowed. "Did your friend disappear with them?" 

"No," Hawke's head swims with the proximity, and she tries to get herself back on track. "No." _Don't stand so close to me, damn it._ "He told me he'd be hiding in an old smuggler's cave." She racks her brain for the details of Alistair's message. "Near Crestwood."

The Inquisitor looks up at her, eyes brimming with sincerity. "I'll take whatever lead I can get at the moment."

It sounds like something Hawke would say, but without the snark. "Good," she mutters. In an attempt to mirror Lavellan's earnest nature, Hawke places a hand on the other woman's shoulder. "I'll do whatever I can to help." She says, feeling an intensity she hasn't felt in a long time. "Corypheus is my responsibility. I thought I'd killed him before." Her tone is grim as she gives Lavellan's shoulder a squeeze. "This time, I'll make sure of it."

For a moment, they are lost in their rooftop pact, and Hawke's blood sings with the promise of a greater purpose. _Stop Corypheus, find the Wardens_. The mantra echoes with a renewed intensity inside of her head, and for a moment she actually believes that it can be done without distraction or deterrence. Hawke is prepared to carry this infectious sense of optimism all the way into battle.

That is, until, Lavellan decides to leave the roof.


	4. IV: Shit Luck

On the road to Crestwood, Varric considers the possibility that he didn't have the best luck with women. The Seeker had almost torn his throat out over Hawke's arrival at Skyhold. Sparky had stood by and almost let her, only stepping in to take her side and all but accuse him of open sabotage against the Inquisition. And then there was Hawke. Varric rubs his forehead. He didn't know _what_ was wrong with Hawke.

He thinks back to her face when she first spotted him on the battlements. It was a look that he had grown accustomed to seeing during their time together in Kirkwall. A hungry, almost predatory look that she had given him many times; a look that was usually accompanied by her calloused fingers trailing along the nape of his neck, her teeth nipping gently at his ear. But as soon as he had registered it, the look was gone, replaced by a look that he had only seen on the Seeker's face when – well, every time the Seeker looked at him. But that was beside the point. He grimaces, thinking about what had happened after Sparky had left them alone on the roof.

 _Hawke watches Fynn leave, her eyes widening with every step taken away from them. Varric steps closer, his blood pounding in his ears, his mind hazy with thoughts of just what order he should strip her armor off in. "I didn't think you'd make it so soon. You must be exhausted." He places his hand on the small of her back. "You know, I doubt Sparky is going to leave for Crestwood right away. And I have a pretty great view of the mountains from my bed." He can feel her body tense as he snakes his arm around her waist. "What d'you say?"_

 _Abruptly, Hawke shoves him back, tearing herself away from him. Her brown cheeks are tinted pink, and her breathing in ragged. She doesn't look at him. "Tell the Inquisitor that I've left for Crestwood." She mutters through gritted teeth, moving towards the stairs._

 _Varric is confused, and his eyebrows furrow. "Hawke," he steps forward, hand outstretched. He catches her elbow. "What's gotten into you? Look at me."_

 _For the first time since stepping onto the battlements, she meets his gaze and stays there. Her eyes are burning, almost wild with rage. "Don't you touch me." She seethes, jerking herself once again out of his grasp. "Don't you_ dare _touch me." Closing her eyes, she breathes deeply._

 _Varric dares to take another step. "Io," he says, more forcefully this time. He can't understand why she looks so angry. So angry at who? At him?_

 _Her eyes snap open, and her gaze is cold. "Tell the Inquisitor," she repeats slowly, "that I've left for Crestwood."_

And then she had left. She had just walked away without another word. Without even a fleeting glance in his direction.

"We're not far from the cave where Hawke said her friend was." Fynn's voice brings him out of his thoughts. "Hopefully we'll find it soon and get a break from this rain." She shoots a frown in his direction. "You've been awfully quiet, Varric. I think the only time I've ever heard you so quiet is when you're unconscious." She pauses, cocking her head to the side. "You're not unconscious, are you?"

"He's not unconscious." Cole frowns back, peering at her from under the brim of his hat. "He's looking right at you."

"Thank you, Cole. How silly of me." She smiles briefly at the boy before turning back to Varric. "But really, what's with you? You've been acting strange since we left Skyhold." Dropping her voice, she gives him a concerned look. "You're not worried about the fight with Cassandra, are you? Because I told you, a new issue of _Swords and Shields_ will clear that problem right up."

"It's not the Seeker." He mutters, waving his hand at the reminder that the fate of his happiness (and possibly the potential for any more unnecessary broken bones) relies completely on continuing his _worst_ serial. "It's nothing." Maybe that was the answer to his Hawke problem too. Maybe it was nothing, just the culmination of all of her nerves from the past – Varric frowns, _how many years was it?_

"She thought you would be angrier." Varric glances up from the path to see Cole looking over at him. "She needed you to be angrier."

Fynn stops walking suddenly, causing Varric to crash into her back. "Wait, who's mad?" She frowns down at him. "Why are you mad at Hawke?"

"I'm _not_ ," he replies through clenched teeth. Varric turns to Cole, "I think you've got your signals mixed up, Kid. There's nothing to be angry about. For either one of us."

Cole thumbs the dagger in his hands, his voice barely audible over the sound of Crestwood's perpetually-falling rain. "So bitter, burning the back of my mouth. 'It's all your fault! I wish I'd never met you!' Maker, it's like acid in my throat. Get out. Just get out." He looks up, a bemused expression making its way onto his face. "But if it was better that way, why did she feel so sad?"

"Wait, wait, wait," Fynn waves her hands wildly. "Are you telling me that you told Hawke that you wished that you never met her? Are you _crazy_?" When Blackwall places his hands on her shoulders, suggesting gently that this might not be any of her business, she frowns. "No, I actually _met_ Hawke." She shakes herself from his grasp. "How could you say that to her, Varric? She didn't deserve that."

"I never said anything like that!" Varric crosses his arms in irritation, looking from Cole to the Inquisitor and back again. "You must be picking up some interference from somewhere, Kid, because I don't have the faintest clue as to what you're talking about."

Cole looks as exasperated as Varric feels, and he shakes his head. "Not Varric," he says. "She needed you to be as angry as she was. It was the only thing protecting her." He runs his hand along the soaking brim of his hat. "That's why she pushed you away on the roof, even though she wanted you to kiss the top of her head the way she likes. Like coming home after running through Lowtown."

"Kiss the top of her – wait a minute, Varric. Are you and Hawke," Fynn is cut off by Blackwall nudging her along the path, leaving Varric some room to ruminate on the latest installment of Cole's inner-thoughts-theater.

At least he had been right in assuming that she was still _his_ Hawke, despite her frightening attempts to hide it. For the life of him, Varric can't remember any sort of fight that had ended in explosive – or, as Cole had put it – acidic confessions that were too poisonous to take back. How could Hawke expect him to be angry about an argument that he couldn't ever remember? They had been inseparable for ten years, slogging through every obstacle that Kirkwall had to offer them. One fight in ten years wasn't enough to ruin all of that, and she should have known that. _But what could the fight have even been about?_ His frown deepens, the gears in his head turning faster and faster. Had it been about Blondie? He couldn't say that he had been completely on board when she decided to let him go, no questions asked. But he can't remember ever resenting it enough for it to turn into a fight. _If not Blondie, what else did we disagree on?_

He ponders this for the rest of the trek to the smuggler's cave, unable to come up with more than the two options of Anders, and who should be the bigger spoon. When they reach the Warden contact's hide-out, he spots her standing at the mouth of the cave. Her arms are folded tightly, the same stony expression etched on her face. She opens her mouth to greet them, but her eyes flick suddenly over the horizon.

A pack of black wolves rush them in a flurry of fur and claws. Varric pulls Bianca off of his back, firing quickly at a wolf heading straight in Hawke's direction. His eyes meet hers as the beast crumples at her feet, and that's when he hears Cole's voice floating over the frenzy. "There it is. That damned crossbow."

And dumbly, Varric watches Hawke's back as she turns and disappears inside of the cave, leaving him in the center of the fray.


	5. V: A Memory, Forgotten

Hawke is wound unbelievably tight throughout Fynn's talk with the warden, Alistair; her arms folded tightly across her chest, her spine as straight and stiff as the greataxe strapped to her back. Varric can't help but stare at her when she interjects, relishing in the brief moment between speaking and glowering that her jaw unlocks when she resembles the woman who would shower him in unwarranted knick-knacks from Lowtown's Trinkets Emporium. It is in those fleeting moments that she resembles his Hawke, and not the terrifying Wyvern of a woman whose fiery glares burnt worse than any of Sparky's misdirected fireballs.

Varric hangs back as Fynn exits the cave, questioning Alistair on everything from the Calling to his time with the Hero of Ferelden. Hawke trails behind Blackwall and Cole, her attention focused on a map she had swiped from a pile of Alistair's sparse belongings. Before she can follow the others out of the hideout, Varric catches her, grasping her firmly by the biceps and dragging her back through the doorframe.

For a moment she stares at him in doe-eyed surprise, her brown cheeks pinkening, evident even in the dim light of the smuggler's den. "Wh-what did I tell you about touching me?" She asks, her eyes quickly narrowing as she averts her gaze. The question is meant to come off rough and in the assertive tone she had adopted since their reunion, but her voice cracks as she stumbles over the words, the sound tugging at the corners of Varric's lips.

"Bianca," he says flatly. "You won't look at me, you won't talk to me." He raises his eyebrows. "Hell, you didn't even write anything dirty in the last letter you sent me." His grip tightens around her arms. "And it's all got something to do with Bianca."

Her already-pink cheeks redden. "I don't know what you're talking about." She replies hotly. "I've been perfectly pleasant with you since receiving your summons."

"Pleasant," Varric repeats. When she doesn't answer, her gaze fixed pointedly on the stone ceiling above their heads, he tries a different approach. If Hawke refused to answer his accusations head on, he would just back her into a corner until she had to. Maybe even literally. Without loosening his grip, Varric takes a deliberate step forward. Followed by another, and another, and another, until finally Hawke's back presses against the cavern wall. "You and I both know that this isn't exactly your idea of pleasant." He says, reaching up to brush his fingers along her jaw, forgetting that the name of the game at this point is restraint.

Her arm free, Varric almost flinches as she lifts it abruptly, wondering if this new Hawke might actually punch him out for laying his hands on her. Instead, she touches his cheek before gripping his shoulder, her eyelids fluttering as she nuzzles into his hand. "Professionalism," she mumbles softly, an answer to a question he isn't sure he asked.

He wedges his knee between her thighs, pinning her hips against the wall with his own. For a moment, he considers himself lucky that Hawke is shorter than most humans, making his attempts at holding her down much smoother than they could have been. Varric tilts his head up, brushing his nose along her neck. "Tell me what it is." He murmurs, his lips scraping the border where her armor ended and she began. "You know I can't do anything unless you tell me."

Hawke holds onto him tightly, as though she was worried that one of them might slip away. Her face pressed against the top of his head, she doesn't move, doesn't speak, and he is briefly concerned that she might not be breathing. Though he is content to stand there and hold her, he knows that she is not, and he pulls back just enough to look up into her worry-flooded face. He remembers what the Kid had said outside: a fight, regret, and then something about Bianca. "Hawke," he begins slowly. When her eyes flit to the side, looking anywhere but at him, he tries again. "Io, I think I know what this is about."

"You do?" Her thick eyebrows are furrowed, and he recognizes a familiar tremble in her voice. She focuses on him, her eyes searching his for some sort of visible reaction.

Smiling reassuringly, he presses a brief kiss to her jaw. "I do. And trust me, it isn't your fault." When she repeats this, he grins. "Of course it's not. I mean, Bianca isn't exactly _new_. And I'm sure that if you broke something off, or maybe knocked something out of calibration, I already fixed it by now." He strokes her cheek with his thumb. "So there's no reason to be upset anymore."

Hawke stares at him, her face frozen somewhere in between the beginnings of relief and utter confusion. Finally, she settles on neither expression, opting instead for the frosty, narrow-eyed look that Varric was growing so accustomed to seeing. "You," she begins, her hands trailing up his neck to cup his face in her calloused hands. "You think this is about Bianca, _the crossbow_?"

The smile on her face reminds him of the frozen, mirthless one Anders had given her as she had unwittingly helped him gather ingredients to make his chantry bomb, and he suppresses a shudder. "Of course. That's what we were fighting about, right?" She mutters something, her grip on his face tightening. "Io, I can't understand you when you're squeezing me like this." He chuckles nervously, twisting in her grasp.

And just like the Kirkwall Chantry, she erupts. " _You think this is about that damned crossbow_?" Her voice is shrill, and she gives him a shove that sends him flying. As he tries to steady himself, she is already pacing around him. The Wyvern Woman back in control. "You really don't remember." For a moment she looks as though she's ready to advance on him again, but she stops suddenly, the fire in her eyes extinguished and replaced with a weariness that he doesn't recognize. "You _really_ don't remember." She repeats, trembling voice small, bouncing weakly off of the walls of the cavern.

He knows that the tears are coming before he sees them, and he rushes forward, deciding that he is willing to risk another sharp push in the other direction. Varric's knees buckle slightly as Hawke's weight drops onto him, and he briefly thinks that this is not the context in which he had wanted to feel her coming down on top of him.

Despite her obvious frustration, she doesn't resist him, her body caving into his with a familiarity that almost made him homesick. Her fist pounds feebly against his back, and he feels her tears hot, running down his neck and seeping under his clothes. "I can't believe you." She sobs faintly. "I can't believe you don't even _remember_."

Before he can ask Hawke just _what_ in Andraste's ass he isn't remembering, Fynn's voice cuts through her muffled crying.

"Varric, we're going to try and seal that rift before we," she stops abruptly as Hawke tears herself away from him. Fynn blinks from Io to Varric, her eyes widening slightly. "Before we meet Hawke and Alistair at the Western Approach," she finishes. Scratching her cheek, she shifts her weight from one foot to the other. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt your – I didn't know – I didn't mean to burst in unannounced. It's just," she looks bashfully at Hawke. "Alistair was looking for you."

Hawke wipes at her eyes, "Yes, it's about time I take my leave. Thank you, Inquisitor." She hurries towards the exit, pausing only to give Fynn a curt nod. "I will see you and," she clears her throat. "I will see you at the Western Approach."

As Varric watches her leave, once again without so much as a backwards glance in his direction, Fynn all but skips over to him, her mouth moving a mile a minute. "What the hell was that, Varric? Were you kissing her? Do you and Hawke kiss when you're alone? Is that what I was missing when I left you two on the battlements?"

"Not now, Sparky." He mutters, still in a daze. He didn't even remember? What was he not remembering?

Fynn stares at him incredulously. "Yes now, Sparky." She says. "Yes now when you're in here kissing Hawke while I'm being attacked by a raging druffalo!" She wiggles her fingers, producing a small shower of sparks. "It's that damn fireball that Dorian taught me. I can never get it quite right."

"Why don't we give you an opportunity to practice your aim, then?" He says, hoping that the promise of setting something ablaze will buy him some time to attempt to remember whatever it was that he was forgetting. "We can start with that rift on the lake."

"Blackwall says that I'm not focusing." She says, already distracted by the possibility. "But how can I think clearly when he has the gall to stand there with his hair blowing in the wind?" She frowns, still examining her fingertips. "Someone really ought to do something about him."

Varric nods, only half-listening as she launches into the next subject, wondering if corrupted Wardens were the only disaster he was to find in the Western Approach.


	6. VI: Our Love Was Lost

Hawke sits near the fire, close enough to feel the burn of a few stray embers eager to escape from the inferno. _He doesn't remember_. Varric's confused face still swims in her mind, and she covers her eyes. _I've been such an ass all this time, and he doesn't even remember._ Instead of relief, she feels her anger being slowly replaced by the white-hot burn of embarrassment, and the unforgiving twist disappointment in her gut. _I've been waiting for almost two years to take it back. Wishing for a clean slate. And here it is, isn't it? Then why am I still so upset?_

Alistair shakes out his bedroll, lowering himself onto the ground next to her. "I can't tell you how long it's been since I've made camp with another person." He scratches his chin. "Sometimes I'd find myself talking the empty space next to me, but now that you're here it won't look so strange." When Hawke doesn't answer, continuing to sulk by the fire, he cocks a brow. "That was supposed to be funny, you know."

"I'm not in the mood for funny." She mumbles. "I've just realized how much of a complete idiot I am, and I'm not in the mood for jokes."

"Only just?" He asks. When she snorts, he gives her a smile. "You might find this hard to believe, but I've had a few moments like that myself." Hawke turns to look at him, and he nods his head sagely. "Oh yes, have I felt like a complete fool at times. And _not_ just because a certain apostate enjoyed pointing it out so often. But do you know what never failed to make me feel better?"

"Cheese?" Hawke suggests, remembering something about Alistair's love of fine cheeses from one of Bethany's letters.

"No." He squints, copper eyebrows furrowing slightly. "Well, yes, sometimes cheese. But I'm not talking about cheese right now." Alistair gestures around to the empty space around them, "I'm talking about this." When Hawke only looks around in bemusement, he rolls his eyes. "This time that we're spending right here in camp, Hawke." A wistful look passes over his face, and his voice softens. "Although, our camp was a little more than just two."

Hawke reaches absently for the amulet around her neck, the one that Alistair had given her during their brief encounter in the chaos of the Qunari uprising. _"This belonged to the love of my life,"_ he had said, pressing it into her hands. _"But she doesn't use it much anymore."_

"You mean the Hero of Ferelden. When you were fighting against the blight."

"Venus," he replies. Upon seeing Hawke's confusion, he clears his throat. "Her name is Venus. _Was_ Venus." He corrects himself quickly, running his thumb along his lower lip. "Don't get me wrong, she deserves every ounce of that title. But she was never just some legend to me. She was," he trails off, as if words could not do justice to the point he was trying to make. Finally, he shrugs. "She was everything. She was Venus."

Hawke leans forward, resting her elbows on her thighs. "And you loved her. You loved her for more than the legend that she was going to be."

"I still love her." He corrects her. "I have loved her more and more every day since." Alistair's face softens. "But yes, the woman I love is not _just_ the Hero of Ferelden."

His eyes are far away, and Hawke is almost hesitant to shake him from his thoughts. Almost. "What was she like?" She asks quietly. "Merrill told me about Tamlen and the mirror, but she didn't know Mahariel like you did." Alistair's dark eyes find hers in the dim light of the fire, and she gestures. "Like you do."

For a moment Hawke thinks that he isn't going to answer. Worse, she feels as though she had overstepped some unspoken boundary between them. But to her relief, Alistair sighs heavily, his fingers trailing lazily through his goatee as he begins. "She used to tell me she loved me at least nine times a day."

"That seems a little excessive." Hawke blurts out before she can think to stop herself. When Alistair just gives her a cock of his brow, she holds her hand up. "I'm sorry, please."

"Even before we were," he pauses, and Hawke wonders if he's blushing. "Well, before we were _us_ , she used to say it. She'd find these little trinkets on the road." He flicks his wrist. "Like nothing, she'd find them. She'd rifle through some poor bastard's things and pull out statuettes, and runestones, and other things like that. And she'd find these things and just plant herself in front of me, holding them out like some kind of offering." Alistair shakes his head, a smile playing on his lips. "Of course I was surprised every time. I'd be lucky if I found a few coppers lying around, but here she was producing treasure right before my eyes. And every time she gave me something, I would gasp and ask, 'Is that for me? Really, you mean it? _Wow!_ " And she would just grin and say, 'Because I love you, Alistair.' Before going on her way."

Hawke raises her eyebrows. "So," she tries to think of how to phrase the question. "So you love her because she showered you in trinkets?" Hawke had showered Varric in trinkets, and he couldn't even remember their only argument. "Trinkets don't sound like foundation for love. Affection, yes. But not love."

"It's not the trinkets." Alistair snaps, seeming more irritated at the interruption of his private reminiscing than at Hawke's slightly cynical view of his relationship with the Hero of Ferelden. He leans forward, his warm, brown skin glowing in the light of the fire. "Someone who had lost everything. Removed from the only family she had ever known, the fate of the world thrown into her hands regardless of whether or not she was ready for it, surrounded by a sea of people begging for help without asking for anything in return. She could have left those trinkets by the side of the road, but she gave them to me instead.

"After Duncan died, I trailed behind her feeling sorry for myself. Wishing out loud that I had been there on the battlefield, wishing that I had been killed right there with him. I knew how lonely it must have made her feel, but I couldn't see past my own selfishness and grief." Alistair's voice threatens to crack, and Hawke watches in silence as he pauses to collect himself. "She could've called me out on it, but she never did. She just collected trinkets and told me she loved me." A tear rolls down his cheek. "Surrounded by people begging for help without asking for anything in return," he repeats quietly.

Hawke reaches out, taking Alistair's hand in her own and squeezing gently. "She didn't need to ask for anything in return." She says, after a moment has gone by. When he glances at her, she smiles faintly. "You love her for her, just as much as she loves you for you. She didn't need anything else."

Wordlessly, Alistair nods, brushing his thumb against the inside of her hand. Hawke thinks about what he had said. How he loved the Hero of Ferelden most when she _wasn't_ the Hero of Ferelden. "I found a letter in his things." She says slowly, letting go of Alistair's hand and folding her own in her lap. "An _intimate_ letter." Alistair looks at her with a carefully guarded expression, waiting for her to elaborate on her own. In return, Hawke rolls her eyes. "Don't look at me like that. I'm sure you heard us in the smuggler's den. I'm sure that the Empress in Orlais heard us in the smuggler's den." She exhales deeply, rubbing her temples with her fingers. "He was being questioned by the Inquisition's seeker, Seeker Pentaghast. I was alone, and it was just sort of lying there. So I read it. I know I shouldn't have. Now, more than ever. But when it happened, I was," she stops herself suddenly.

 _I was what?_ She frowns. _I was looking for a way out? I was looking for the crack in the armor that would justify getting rid of it?_

"So I read it." She says, choosing not to vocalize those possibilities. "It wasn't particularly _naughty_. I've left dirtier things scribbled in the margins of his manuscripts." Hawke frowns deeply. "But it was terribly intimate. Reading it made me feel just _wrong_. Like I was playing voyeur to the personal life of a stranger. It's not as though I needed to know everyone on his correspondence list, but," Hawke bites her lip. "Ten years is a lot of talking to a person and it felt like a deliberate omission. So I got angry."

Hawke remembers how pleased with himself Varric had looked upon entering the room. _"I told them everything."_ She could almost feel the scratch of his stubble against her skin as she recalls how he had peppered kisses from the center of her forehead to the crown of her skull, his lips grinning against her skin. _"Well, almost everything. I left out the stuff about us."_

She sees herself, wild and unhinged, a state that she had forced herself to live in for time since. _"And did you tell them about Bianca?"_ She had demanded, flinging the letter in his face when he started talking about his crossbow. _"Why didn't you tell me?"_ She had screeched, hot tears pooling in her eyes. _"You could've at least told me!"_

"He thought that I was mad about her." Hawke says, drawing herself away from the memory. "He thought that I felt like the other woman, but I _knew_ that there was a Bianca." Her eyes squint as she tries to put the feeling into words, and she looks to Alistair for help. "You said that you love Venus for the woman behind the myth. After feeling so isolated by that letter, and when he came in talking about the interrogation and the 'Champion of Kirkwall,'" she rubs her hand along the top of her head. "I felt like I was just a plot device. Like I was a good story to be told to whoever would listen. Like I wouldn't be able to live up to the hero in his stories. And I felt like he preferred it that way. It kept things uncomplicated. So I told him that I wished I'd never met him." Hawke hugs her knees to her chest, staring into the flames. "The only thing keeping me together for a decade, and I told him that my life would've been infinitely better without him in it."

Alistair places a gentle hand on her shoulder. "People say things they don't mean. I'm sure he–"

"He doesn't remember that I said it." Hawke cuts him off, turning sharply. "For the last two years, I've been worrying myself thinking that he's angry with me for being so careless with my words. For saying something like that to purposely hurt him. But he doesn't even remember having the conversation." Her lip trembles. "Two years, Alistair. And it didn't make a difference. It didn't make a difference because it wasn't a part of the story he tells, so it isn't worth remembering." She buries her head in her arms, her heaving body struggling to remain in its folded position. "I brought the trinkets to someone who already had their hands full."

Alistair rubs her shoulder as she curls further into herself. Hawke thinks about how if they're unable to help the Wardens in time, a broken heart will be the least of her concerns. But in the moment, she doesn't care. Shakily, she reaches back for Alistair's hand again, clinging to it tightly as she tries to calm herself down. Together, they sit in silence, the heavy air of lost love dissipating into the bone-white smoke curling up from the charred remains of a long-dead flame.


	7. VII: Falling Up

Somewhere outside of the Western Approach, Varric stares into the open sky above their heads, searching for answers to questions he isn't sure he knows how to ask. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Cole roll onto his side to face him, the boy's eyes searching for his own in the dim light of dying fire. Varric doesn't turn, figuring that if Cole has something to say, he'll just come out and say it. Blurt it out, as he is expected to do.

Sure enough, he hears it. "You remembered."

He had remembered. Had remembered emerging from the darkness of the interrogation room with Hawke's name on the tip of his tongue. He had remembered the sight of her, draped in a large shirt she had found in a bin somewhere in the Black Emporium, sitting in the center of his bed. How warm her skin had been under his lips, before she had given him that cold stare and flung Bianca's letter in his face. He had remembered all of this, and yet he still could not figure out for the life of him why she was still so upset.

She had left that day, scrambling into whatever clothes she could scrounge up from the floor, hurling curses at him as she made her way towards the door. But it had all been an outburst, hadn't it? The product of too many stresses building up at once. Granted, Hawke had usually turned to more _physical_ outlets when stress was involved, but sometimes people argued with each other when they were bogged down by pent-up emotions, didn't they?

At his side, Cole is drawing circles into the dirt. "Trinkets," he says suddenly. "She gave you the trinkets, but you didn't really want them. She didn't know you had enough." He looks out at him through his bangs, his eyebrows furrowing slightly. "But she didn't hear the hum in your chest. The one that's warmest when she smiles. It's why she thinks they're not important."

"This isn't about knick-knacks, Kid." Varric says with as much patience as he can muster. "This is about one stubborn human who forgot how to talk to me."

Cole is silent for a moment before he tries again. "She thinks that you said no." He props himself up on his elbows, chin resting on his hands. "She thinks it's always been no." When Varric tells him that he doesn't know what he's talking about, Cole continues. "Hands strong around my arms. _Ow_. My head scraping against the alley wall. Aveline will ask questions. _'Too bad I'm not into Humans.'_ Then why is he kissing me so hard?"

He had said that, hadn't he. Merrill had deflected Hawke's casual flirtations, saying she was sure that Hawke told Varric he was pretty multiple times a day. He remembers the way her cheeks pinkened, the blush spreading to her ears in that way that always set the laughter bubbling up in the pit of his stomach. How bashful she had been as they left the Alienage, her hands clasped tightly behind her back. _"Not into humans, huh?"_ She had asked, giving him the faux-innocent tone he had thought she reserved for Aveline. _"What if I grew a beard and crouched down a bit?"_

And he had laughed, had complimented her as he always did. _"Hawke, you're beautiful. You're deadly. But Bianca's the only one for me."_ But even as she giggled - running her hand over the top of her head as she always did when she was nervous - he couldn't ignore the stirring deep within him. The stirring that had noticed the way her gaze lingered on him three-ales-deep at the Hanged Man. The same stirring that had – in an unusual bout of selfishness – sent pangs of irritation coursing through him when he thought of that honey-sweet gaze being turned on anybody else. The same stirring that kept him awake some nights long after the fighting was over, his mind cluttered with thoughts of just how far under her armor that blush of hers travelled.

And before he could do what he usually did – wave those thoughts off and chalk it up to spending too much time working on romance serials – he was taking her by the arms and nudging her into the nearest alley. Despite the fact that he had seen her pick up and toss men twice his size, Hawke hadn't fought him. Nor had she protested when he pinned her against that dirty stone wall, his hands on either side of her face, pulling her down until he had closed any and all space between them.

"How are you getting all of this anyway?" He asks, trying to shake himself away from the alley. "Hawke's not here."

"She couldn't hear the hum, and now none of it was real." He replies.

Varric doesn't answer, his eyes still fixed on the sky above. For a moment he wishes that it was actually possible to just fall up into it. Finally, he closes his eyes, falling in and out of a restless sleep until Sparky announces that it's time to start moving once more.


	8. VIII: Tower of Terror

Hawke leans against the pillar at the mouth of the ritual tower, her eyes cast out into the unending horizon in front of them. "Do you think they're okay?" She asks Alistair, squinting past the harsh sunlight to glance over at her companion. "The scout said that they were on their way."

"You do realize that this is the Inquisitor we're talking about, yes?" He throws her a cheeky grin. "Or are you anxious about reconciling with a certain _fine Dwarven craft_." She flushes, stammering through a scattered threat of violence, and he laughs. "Oh, look at you! That's adorable." Alistair sidles up and rests an elbow against the space next to her head. "Tell me, did you pick that flower that you were staring at back at camp? Because take it from someone who knows, you can never go wrong with a handpicked rose."

"Oh thank the Maker," Hawke straightens, gesturing in the distance. "The Inquisitor." When Alistair only returns this with a cock of his brow, she gestures with a more punctuated thrust of her hand. "No, really, there she is."

"Mm," he hums, pushing himself off of the column. "Don't think I'll forget where we left off, Hawke." Alistair throws her a wink before stepping forward to meet Lavellan halfway. "I'm glad you made it, Inquisitor. I fear they've already started the ritual."

Hawke takes a moment to compose herself, trying desperately to will the blush from her cheeks before she steps forward. "Blood magic, I'd wager." She adds, planting herself at Alistair's side. "You can smell it…or see the corpses."

At Lavellan's side, Varric snorts before quickly averting his eyes when Hawke meets his gaze.

The Inquisitor nods, her eyes flashing brightly. "You take point. I'll guard your backs."

The walk up through the tower is long and paved in the corpses of sacrificed Wardens. At the helm of the gory display is a greasy-looking man with a hooked nose and a sneer etched deep into his face. He laughs gleefully as another Warden is cut down for the ritual. "Inquisitor, what an unexpected pleasure." The man sinks into an deep bow in an over-exaggerated show of formality. "Lord Livius Erimond of Verantium, at your service."

Alistair steps forward, his tone like broken glass. "You are no Warden." He snarls.

"Ah, but you are." Erimond sighs. "The one Clarel let slip. And you found the Inquisitor and came to stop me!" He cocks his head to the side. "Shall we see how that goes?"

Lavellan plants herself in front of Hawke, looking around at Erimond's lackeys. "Wardens! This man is lying to you! He serves an ancient Tevinter magister who wants to unleash a Blight!"

Hawke frowns, stepping back until she reaches Varric's side. "Varric, look at them." She mutters, her stare fixed on the Wardens' dead eyes. "They're already too far gone." She looks down at him. "Like the Dwarves at the prison."

Sure enough, Erimond demonstrates this by lifting his hand, the Wardens obeying without a second thought. Alistair's voice cuts through the silence. "Corypheus has taken their minds."

"They did this to themselves." Erimond says sharply. "The Calling had the Wardens terrified. They looked _everywhere_ for help."

"Even Tevinter." He says grimly.

"Yes and since it was my master who put the Calling into their little heads, we in the Venatori were prepared. I went to Clarel full of sympathy, and together, we came up with a plan." He gestures sweepingly. "Raise a demon army, march into the Deep Roads, and kill the Old Gods before they wake."

Lavellan nods. "Ah, I was wondering when the demon army would show up." For a moment, Hawke admires how genuinely unimpressed she sounds.

"You knew about it, did you?" Erimond falters briefly before composing himself. "Well then, here you are. Sadly for the Wardens, the binding ritual I taught their mages has a side effect. They're now my Master's slaves." He continues to grin his smarmy grin. "This was a test. Once the rest of the Wardens complete the ritual, the army will conquer Thedas."

"This is what Larius was warning against." Hawke says in an aside to Varric. "When we caught up to Janeka before we," her mouth twists, the admission sticking in her throat. "Before I undid the seal." When he reaches out hesitantly, his hand eventually coming down gently on her arm, she sighs. "Varric, what have I _done_?"

They are interrupted by the sound of magic crackling in the air, and Lavellan's cry of pain as she crumples to the ground, her hand glowing brightly with Corypheus' boon. "The Elder One showed me how to deal with you, in the event you were foolish enough to interfere again." Erimond gloats, his hand outstretched. "That mark you bear? You stole that from my master. He's been forced to seek other ways to access the fade."

In his moment of over-confidence, Erimond does not see the grin slowly spreading across Lavellan's face. But Hawke doesn't miss it, nor does she miss the other woman's giggle when she manages to use Erimond's own magic against him.

The magister cries out in surprise as he is knocked back, the force knocking the wind out of him. Wrapping an arm around his middle, he hobbles away, barking orders at his cronies. "Wardens, kill them!"

They are charged in a flurry of steel and claws by both Warden and demon alike. Hawke's fingers tighten around the handle of her greataxe, cutting down one of the mages before they can summon another shade. In the briefest of moments, she sees Bethany in the girl's face as she crumples at her feet, and Hawke suddenly feels sick to her stomach. _Aveline got her out_ , she reminds herself. _She isn't a part of this._

"Get away from me, you bastards!"

Hawke's head snaps up at the sound of Varric's voice, and she turns in time to see three shades closing in on him. Without a second thought, she's charging across the tower, axe raised and at the ready. "Varric, duck!" She yells, waiting for him to drop to the ground before cutting them down with a single, sweeping arc. As they fall, she sees Varric flat on his face on the ground, his head buried in his arms. He braves a peek, and Hawke smiles, holding out her hand. "The Inquisition's made you soft." She teases, helping him to his feet. "The Varric Tethras _I_ knew would have shot them down and called them 'nug-humping bastards.'"

Slowly, a smile spreads over his face, and he appears relived. "What can I say, Hawke? I knew you'd swoop in and save me." He looks around as they regroup with the others. "I think we got 'em all."

"You were correct, Hawke." Alistair says, his mouth set in a tight line. "Through their ritual, the mages are slaves to Corypheus."

Hawke folds her arms, "and the Warden warriors?" When she is given only somber looks in return, she nods. "Oh, of course. It's not _real_ blood magic until someone gets sacrificed."

Lavellan shakes her head, eyebrows coming together in confusion. "Human sacrifice, demon summoning," she throws her hands up in frustration. "Who looks at this and thinks it's a good idea?"

"The fearful and the foolish," Hawke says flatly. When Alistair argues that the Wardens still had their reasons, she spits. "All blood mages do. Everyone has a story they tell themselves to justify bad decisions, and it never matters." For a moment she wonders if she's talking about the Grey Wardens or herself. "In the end, you are always alone with your actions."

The words hang bitterly in the air, and Hawke shifts her weight from one foot to the other. It was an uncomfortable truth, yes, but the most important ones usually were. If there was anyone who knew this more than anyone, it was Hawke. She had made the choice to investigate the prison in the mountains because of a desire to learn more about her father. She had unleashed Corypheus upon the world because she thought that she herself had the ability to take him down. And she had made the choice to live with those decisions without the help of anyone else.

"I believe I know where the Wardens are, your worship." Alistair says, changing the subject. "Erimond fled in that direction. There's an abandoned Warden fortress that way. Adamant."

Hawke nods, "Alistair and I will scout Adamant and confirm that the other Wardens are there. We'll meet you back at Skyhold with any information."

"Good thinking," Lavellan replies. "We have some more business to take care of here in the Approach, but we'll see you there."

They leave the ritual tower and its carnage behind, moving across the desert as the sun hangs low in the sky. Before the two groups diverge, Hawke reaches out to grab Varric's sleeve, the fabric rough against her fingertips. "Varric," but when he looks at her, her mind goes blank, and she isn't sure what she wants to say. Does she want to apologize? To promise that she'll explain everything that's been going on? To simply sweep it under the rug with a sideways comment and a laugh? Hawke smiles shakily, letting him go. "Be careful, alright?"

"I'll see you back at Skyhold, Hawke." He says, returning her concern with a flash of a grin, before he turns and sets back out into harm's way.


	9. IX: Life of the Party

Skyhold is no less impressive on her second trip, and it doesn't take long for Hawke to unlatch herself from Alistair's side and set out to explore. The Inquisitor and company were, as far as she knew, still travelling from the Western Approach. Though, the scout she had spoken to had warned her that Lavellan was in the habit of bending the truth when it came to her travel-logging. Regardless, her absence had left some time for Hawke to dig around, for which she was grateful.

Well, she had been grateful, until she had spotted a barely-recognizable face barking orders at a group of trainees.

"Well if it isn't Knight-Captain Cullen," she says loudly, causing the blond to jump. "Still in the habit of frightening recruits, I see."

His mouth sets into a thin line. "Hawke," he says flatly. "I heard that Varric had contacted you. Although, I was under the impression that you would be investigating Adamant Fortress. Not interrupting my training exercises." Cullen folds his arms tightly across his chest. "And I would prefer it if you wouldn't refer to me as 'Knight-Captain.' I am the Commander of the Inquisition's forces. Not a Templar."

"I'm sorry, _Commander_ Cullen." Hawke replies, her voice oozing with sarcasm. "I was thrown by the Templar insignia on your armor. As for my investigation," she says, mirroring his cross-armed stance. "Alistair and I returned from the Western Approach with information for the Inquisitor, but she hasn't made it back to Skyhold as yet. So I thought I'd just take a look around." She peers over his shoulder at the poor souls he had been barking at moments before. "Awful lot of mages, you have here. I can't imagine you were pleased with the Inquisitor's decision to side with those dreadful apostates over the mighty Templar Order."

"The Inquisitor made her choice, and I will uphold that decision to the best of my ability." He says through tightly clenched teeth. When Hawke points out that he looks none too pleased about this, he snaps. "I have a lot of work to do and little time to do it. So if you're finished antagonizing me, I would like to get back to my duties."

Hawke snaps up straight in mock-salute. "As you wish, Commander." She glares daggers at his back as he walks away. "Horse's ass," she mutters, setting off in the direction of Skyhold's tavern.

The Herald's Rest reminds her of the Hanged Man, albeit without the lurking suspicion that you may be stabbed upon entry. For a moment, she misses Kirkwall terribly, her heart yearning not for her empty mansion in Hightown, but rather the darkened corner of her favorite table, a cold pint nestled in her hands and Varric's thigh warm against her own. With this thought in mind, she wanders up the stairs of the Herald's Rest, trying to capture some of that same security in this new, foreign place. Hawke finds this peace on the third floor, a darkened space that seems to be part of a different world entirely. As she wonders if it would've been smarter to perhaps get a drink before climbing the stairs, she spots one of the Inquisitor's companions lingering in the corner of the room.

He is terribly young, and terribly thin, the floppy hat atop his head accounting for most of his body weight. As Hawke gets closer, looking past the shadows dancing across his face, she thinks that he looks terribly sad. "Drinking alone?" She asks, despite the fact that she sees no drink in his hand. "My name's Hawke, I don't think we've been properly introduced."

"Cole." He says, his voice barely more than a whisper.

Hawke tries to think about where she's seen him before. "Wait, I thought you were with the Inquisitor. At the Approach."

"She was sad to leave me behind, but daggers can't kill a dragon." He replies slowly. "And the Iron Bull would be jealous if he didn't come along." Cole frowns. "But she doesn't like the way he talks to Dorian, so she asked for Vivienne instead."

Hawke sits at a small table pushed against the wall, motioning for him to join her. "That's alright, I'm sure that you aren't missing out on too much anyway. Skyhold's far better than mucking around the Western Approach. Not as much sand in," she shudders. "Places."

In the dim light of the small lamp on the table, Hawke catches a glimpse of Cole's eyes under the brim of the hat. He stares at her thoughtfully, and for a moment she feels completely disarmed. "Sand everywhere, gritty in-between my toes. Her head bent low, flinching away from my touch. 'It's just sand, Varric. I'm fine.'"

Hawke can almost smell the dry air of the Vimmark Mountains, and she stares at Cole in amazement. "After we fought Corypheus," she says. "That was on our way back to Kirkwall. I was crying because Bethany had to go back to the Wardens, and I was torn up about Father." She frowns. "Why would he tell you about that? That's not even the most interesting part of that story."

"No one told me anything." Cole replies. "The sand makes him hurt because he knows it made you cry. Just like the letters and the smell of white lilies. He wanted to make it better, but you wouldn't let him in."

Hawke's blood chills at the thought of the flowers that had sealed her mother's fate, but she covers this with a snort. "Varric must be truly desperate for material if he's telling those stories." She says, resting her chin on her hand. "Why don't I tell you about the time I was supposed to learn how to turn into a dragon? That's far more interesting than listening to stories about crying."

"Freshly-shed blood and the smell of scorched earth. The sound of wings beating like drums in my head. She wanted to be a dragon, not a wyvern." Cole looks at her thoughtfully. "He heard music when you touched him. Like coming home."

For a minute Hawke doesn't know what to say, a blush creeping under her skin and sizzling to the surface. Clearing her throat, she tries to think about what Cole is saying. "Wait a minute. That sounds like you're talking about dragon hunting. Does the Inquisitor take Varric to kill dragons that often?" When he says no, she shakes her head in disbelief. "Oh come now, you're not telling me that you can read Varric's mind." Hawke pauses, lowering her voice. "Wait, _can_ you read minds? What number am I thinking of?"

Cole looks at her wearily. "It's not his _mind_." He replies. "He wants to be careful because he knows you're waiting for him."

But Hawke is only half-listening. "This might be even better than being a dragon. Do you think you can teach me how to do it?" She cocks her head. "Or is it just like some sort of party trick? When I lived in Lothering, there was a man who taught his Mabari to dance on its hind legs while he played the lute." She chuckles to herself. "He used to bring him in the middle of town and stand outside the tavern on weekends."

"Serah Hawke," they are interrupted by an Inquisition scout standing at the top of the stairs. "The Inquisitor has returned from the Approach. She'll be waiting in the War Room for your reconnaissance from Adamant."

Hawke nods, "Thank you." Rising from the table, she glances downs to assure Cole that their conversation is far from over. However, she finds his chair empty, the candle from the lamp flickering weakly. Frowning, she looks around before coming to the conclusion that it's just part of the illusion. There would be time to learn after Adamant.


	10. X: Good Ol' Days

Time seems to stand still when he sees her coming down the corridor, and Varric's heart leaps into his throat at the sight. For the first time since their reunion, she is out of her armor, dressed down in a billowing cotton shirt and a pair of loose breeches. "What giant did you kill to pull that outfit together?" He asks as she approaches. "I know you're not Rivaini, but that shirt is big. Even for you."

Hawke fumbles with her sleeves, pushing them up to her elbows. "All of my clothes smelled like the cheese Alistair put in my pack, so I had to improvise. One of your recruits – Sera, I think her name was – told me about a surplus of breeches being stored in the barracks." She scratches her cheek, looking almost bashful. "How was dragon hunting?"

"Well, I've got a burn on my ass the size of a sovereign, and I think I might be deaf in one ear." He grins, "But we killed it. I'm sure Sparky'll show you the tooth when she gets here. She's been flashing it at anyone who'll pay attention."

"You call the Inquisitor," Hawke pauses. "Sparky? It sounds like a dog's name."

"You know, I did start out with 'Boss' at first." He replies. "You know, because of respect and authority and all that. But then one day in the Hinterlands she managed to accidently hit both me and Chuckles – he's an Elf, you'll love him – with a chain of lightning." Varric shrugs. "Sparky just seemed more fitting."

Hawke laughs, and for the briefest of moments a burst of light explodes behind Varric's eyes. "Oh no," she manages to get out through her giggles. "You poor thing. Between the dragon burns and misdirected spells – well, I hope you have plenty of poultices handy." She wipes a tear from the corner of her eye, looking at him warmly. "It can't be as bad as fighting off those dragons at the Bone Pit. I'm fairly sure that I was rubbing you down months after." She shakes her head. "The smell of bacon was never quite the same for me after that."

"Oh come on, Hawke. Those burns weren't the only reasons you were rubbing me down." He laughs as she mumbles something incoherently, the blush creeping up her neck and spreading across her cheeks.

For the first time in months, Varric feels truly content. A careful voice at the back of his head warns him that the last time he felt confident in Hawke's mood, she had thrown him across the smuggler's cave, but it is soon silenced by her calloused fingers trailing along his jaw line.

"I've missed you, Varric. I've missed us." She says softly, running her thumb along his lower lip. "I," she falters, her eyebrows knotting together in hesitation. "You were right, you know? What you said at Crestwood, that I haven't exactly been _pleasant_ the last few times we've met." She tucks a stray strand of hair behind his ear, toying absently with his earring. "It's rather silly, but I've just felt so –"

"Hawke," Curly strides up the hallway sending a curt nod in their direction, "a scout has just informed me that you gave your information regarding Adamant Fortress to Leliana." When Hawke stares at him blankly, her fingers still toying absently with Varric's earlobe, he reddens. "As opposed to the Inquisition's military commander."

"And that would be?" Hawke cocks her head, playing stupid. When Curly sputters angrily, she gasps, her mouth opening into a wide o-shape. "Oh, oh yes, I remember now."

"But you couldn't have remembered to tell me that the information had already been sent along earlier today while you were interrupting my training." He replies icily.

Varric cuts in, raising his hand to interrupt. "Now, now, Curly, I'm sure Hawke has her reasons for going to Nightingale before you. Maybe," he pauses. "Maybe she thought that such covert information should be handled by the Inquisition's spymaster. And she knew that you'd get the message eventually."

"Yes, that's it." Hawke nods, "That one." She watches as Cullen turns on his heel and slips into the War Room, muttering angrily on his breath. "Oh dear," she gives Varric an exaggerated look of concern. "I think we've upset him." She shakes her head. "Have I mentioned that I don't care for him? Because I really don't."

"Oh, Curly's not all bad." When Hawke doesn't seem convinced, he concedes. "Alright, he's a little tightly-wound, I'll give you that. But forget about that," he reaches for her hand, threading his fingers through hers. "I think we were having a moment. What were you going to say? 'Oh Varric, I've been such a fool. Take me with the passion of a thousand Ferelden armies!'" He grins, "Something like that?"

Hawke rolls her eyes. "Now I know why you don't work on romances anymore. And my voice is nowhere near that high." Slowly, she backs him against the wall, her fingers walking up his chest. "But I have been foolish. Very foolish." Hawke sighs, resting her forehead against his. "I'm exhausted, Varric. Do you know how draining it is to be so angry all the time?" Her fists tighten around his shirt, her knuckles pressing into his chest. "I still want to be angry with you, I really do. But I'm just so tired."

"Why?" He asks, turning his head slightly to press a kiss against her cheek. "Why do you want to be angry?" Gently, he pushes her back, just enough to look up into her eyes. "Tell me, and I'll fix it." He cups her face, trying to convince this beautiful, _frustrating_ woman to just let him in for once. "I just need you to tell me."

Hawke looks as though she is about to crumble, and the confession looms on the edge of her parted lips as she holds his hand tightly against her skin. "Varric, I –"

"Sorry I'm late!" Sparky's voice echoes through the chamber, and Varric feels Hawke jump out of her skin as she scrambles to put some distance between them. Sparky eyes them suspiciously, a grin beginning to spread across her face. "I'm not _interrupting_ anything, am I?" She asks, staring at Varric pointedly.

She had terrorized him with questions on their way back to Skyhold about his relationship with Hawke. Questions that had caused even Tiny to blush.

Hawke changes the subject. "I tracked that Venatori mage back to Adamant Fortress." She says, running her hand over the top of her head. "They're looking at the assault options now in the War Room."

"Thanks for coming," Varric hears himself say, the words cutting through the Hawke-induced fog in his brain.

Sparky raises her eyebrows in amusement. "Yes, Varric is ever so pleased that you've come, Hawke. He was thinking about you coming the entire time we were camped out at the Approach. That's probably what kept him in his tent so long."

"Yes, well, you did well, Varric." Hawke continues, speaking loudly over Sparky's double entendre. "The Inquisitor is," she pauses. "She is just who we need."

And though Varric knows that she is just trying to steer the conversation into a more professional light, he doesn't miss the rare glimmer of sincerity in Hawke's words. He can't help but return Sparky's grin, despite the heat of embarrassment still warming his cheeks. "It's been great. Murderous Wardens, Archdemon attacks, plenty of blood mages, and crazy Templars. Just like home."

"I know how much you hated leaving Kirkwall." Hawke replies. "Although, you must admit that Ferelden has its charms."

"I know that's your Ferelden pride showing through," he says. "But this is the ass-end of Thedas. You know they eat _snails_ here? Still, I think," he looks to the Inquisitor. "I think I need to finish this out. If it weren't for me and Bartrand, none of this would have happened." He shakes his head, chuckling bitterly. "So much for changing our lives."

"That's what happens when you try to change things." Hawke says gently. "They change. You can't always control how." Turning to Sparky, she smiles, crossing her arms across her chest. "You're doing important work here, Inquisitor. And you're doing it with the efficiency that I never could. I'll be behind you every step of the way, if it's the last thing I do."

Sparky looks from Hawke to Varric to Hawke again, her wide eyes welling with tears, before she grabs them both and pulls them in for a surprisingly-tight embrace. "I'm going to make you two so proud." She says, her grip tightening.

"We're not your parents, Sparky." Varric mutters. "You don't have to sound so serious."

She shushes him. "So, so proud," She repeats. Drawing back, Sparky claps her hands. "Now then," she grins. "Let's go fight us some Wardens."


	11. XI: Bread and Jam

Fear jolts Hawke awake in the dead of night, its icy claws still tight around her throat as she sits up. Instinctively, she reaches for Varric at her side, groping blindly in the darkness until the realization hits that she is alone in a borrowed bed at Skyhold, far away from the comforts of home. Her ragged breathing fills the room, a harsh wheezing sound that grates against her eardrums. The nightmare is gone, a forgotten wisp left in the Fade where it belongs, but she can still feel scraps of its presence lurking in the darkest corners of the bedroom.

Hawke glances out of the window, the only light outside coming from a few stray lanterns at guard stations in the courtyard. The Inquisitor, following her meeting with her advisors, had informed Hawke and Alistair that they would be leaving for Adamant at sunrise. Later, Varric had pulled her aside and told her that their actual time of departure wouldn't be until well into the morning. Hawke had retreated into her borrowed chambers with the hope that she would be able to rest easy – well, as easy as one could with an impending attack on the horizon – in Skyhold's relative luxury. But now she was awake, her insides churning with a fear that she could not shake, well before the sun was due to rise.

She swings her legs over the side of the bed, bare feet pressing against the cold stone floor. _A walk_ , she thinks as she crosses the room. _Taking a walk will calm me down._ Opening the door, she peers out into the empty hallway, the hairs on the back of her neck standing. Skyhold, though beautiful during the day, was horribly eerie at night. Even for someone who had made a hobby of slaying a number of frightening creatures.

She creeps down the hallway, her hands sliding against the wall for guidance. There had been torches lit on the wall when she had gone to bed, Hawke was sure of it, but the constant draft had managed to weaken the flames sometime during the night. She gropes around in the darkness until she is able to find another lit corridor, leading to a flight of stairs. There is a warmth radiating from the lower floor, and she wonders briefly if she is anywhere near the kitchens. Slowly, Hawke descends, taking care not to lose her footing on the slippery stone steps. She finds herself in another dimly-lit corridor, a ghostly silhouette hunched over by the window.

For a moment, Hawke wants to scream and run back to the relative safety of her chambers, but as her feet carry her forward, she recognizes the outline of a familiar floppy hat. "Cole?" She half-whispers, her voice bouncing around uncertainly in the silence of the hall. When he turns wordlessly, his face looking gaunt and ghostly in the moonlight streaming through the window, she sighs in relief and joins him. "What are you doing here all alone?" She frowns when she sees the knife in his hands. "Cutting plums by the window?"

"Spider webs," he says simply, as though _she_ is the strange one for asking. "For the healers." Cole returns to his slicing, deft fingers making quick work of the remaining pieces of fruit. "It wasn't real, you know. Your dream."

"Oh yes," Hawke remembers their conversation in the attic of the Herald's Rest. "Cole, resident soothsayer to the Inquisition. How could I forget?"

His eyebrows contract and he stares at her in bemusement. "I can't read the future." He argues, his voice taking on a boyish, almost childish tone. "Besides, your dream already happened."

"But I could have another nightmare," Hawke insists as he arranges the plums in neat piles on either side of the windowsill. "I could have another one that is equally unsettling, and then you would have been right about my future because that dream won't be real either." Cole doesn't respond, and Hawke shifts her weight from foot to foot uncomfortably. "Say, Cole, you wouldn't happen to know where the kitchens are, would you?"

"Bread and jam," he replies, turning away from the window and setting down the hall.

Hawke knows she's meant to follow, and she trails after him, struggling to slow her anxious legs to match his easy pace. "The best magic to stave off a nightmare, according to my father." She says brightly. "It's always helped me." Cocking her head in concern, she looks at him. "I think you should join me. You're terribly thin."

"Magic," Cole repeats. "Bethany's first fireball, everything hot, burning around me. Father, hands warm, humming songs about dragons as he changes my bandages. Watching their lessons through teary eyes, 'I wish I was a mage.'"

They enter the kitchens, and Hawke smiles fondly at the memory, her fingers trailing over the light scars on her scalp. "It was one of the first showings of Bethany's magic, and I got stuck in the crossfire." She examines a jar left on the large center table, pausing to decipher the scribble on its label. "The burns weren't so bad, but watching Bethany and father have their lessons made me horribly jealous. It felt as though they were in their own world that I could never be a part of. I was too young to understand the consequences of that world." She shakes her head, her mind swimming with half-blurred images of her father's patient smile, his thumb brushing away her tears. "It was only after I got older, saw what hiding his magic had done to my father, that I realized that I could be a part of it. I could protect those I loved from a system so eager to see them in chains."

She thinks of Bethany, run-down from the effects of the Taint, her brown skin sallow and clammy to the touch, her eyes still ablaze with the same undying fireball. She thinks of Anders, driven half-mad by Justice, his thin body hollow in her arms as he wept when she spared his life and helped him into hiding. She thinks of her father, of the proud man muted in front of the Lothering chantry, always holding her hand just a little too tightly when the Templars walked by.

Hawke cuts two meaty slices from a dark loaf of bread, spreading thick layers of plum jam onto them as she speaks. "'The Maker gave us two types of magic, Io.'" She speaks from the base of her stomach, trying to capture her father's rumbling voice. "'There are lightning bolts and fireballs, and there is bread and jam. Both are warm, but only one comes from a place of love.'" She smiles at Cole as she holds out one of the slices, waiting until he takes it to bite into her own. Chewing thoughtfully, she nods. "I think I'm quite happy to be blessed with the latter."

Cole holds his bread unmovingly, as though posing for a particularly delicious portrait. "You feel it, but you won't say it because it makes them go away." For the first time, Hawke can see the briefest flicker hesitation in his eyes as he stares at her. "In your dream you wished you said it more."

"You know," Hawke speaks through a mouthful of bread, spewing crumbs out onto the table. "The more we play this game, the less I like it." She swallows. "Why don't you try card tricks or something like that? Ask Varric to show you the one where he pulls it out from inside your ear." But Cole doesn't seem interested in sleight of hand magic, and Hawke sighs. "Love is like any other magic. It's dangerous. Bread and jam is all of the warmth without any of the danger."

"Carver, baby Carver, twisted and mangled on the cold ground. His eyes – father's eyes – so dull, just like mother's in the pits under Lowtown. I could've done better. _I need to do better._ "

A shiver creeps up Hawke's spine, her body cooling despite the roaring fire in the kitchen. She feels the residue of her nightmare creeping through Cole's words, a shadow waiting to pounce. "I think," she says weakly. "I think that's enough for tonight." She turns, motioning for Cole to follow her out of the room.

"It wasn't real." He says again as they make the trip back to her chamber, the corridors blending together until Hawke can't figure out _where_ they are. "You just have to be louder."

Hawke frowns. "This doesn't look like the right hallways." She mumbles, before registering what he had said. "Louder than _what_ , Cole?" She asks, whipping to face the boy in frustration.

"Hawke?"

She glances down to see the door in front of her opening a crack, a confused and visibly-groggy Varric standing before her. Hawke gestures behind her shoulder. "Oh, Varric, this is – I was just," she turns to motion to Cole, only to realize that she is alone in the corridor. "Of course. I was just," she repeats, wondering what she had done to deserve this. "I was just asking loud questions to myself in front of your bedroom." She finishes lamely, shrugging her shoulders in defeat. "Just trying to spread some last minute insanity before we set off for Adamant. In several hours."

"Maker's breath, Hawke," he mutters, pushing the door open wider. "If I invite you in, will you stop shouting to yourself out here?" He doesn't wait for an answer, turning and lumbering back into the room.

For a moment, she falters, the threat of her nightmare still looming on the edges of her mind. But in the doorway, she can feel the warm smells of the chamber wrapping around her. The smell of parchment and ink, polish for Bianca, and subtle notes of cinnamon and anise – it smells of Varric, and Hawke feels herself crossing the threshold against her better judgment, bad dream be damned for just one night.


	12. XII: A Rude Awakening

Varric wakes to an empty bed and the crinkle of parchment beneath his fingertips. Blinking his eyes into focus, he sits up, attempting to piece the night together. He remembers Hawke's voice barging through his dreams. Hawke standing outside of his room, eyes lost, the sweet smell of jam still on her breath. Varric, knowing immediately that it must've been a nightmare, restraining himself from pulling her into the room, worrying that any outward show of concern would only serve to scare her off.

He yawns, unfolding the sheet of paper left on Hawke's pillow:

 _Varric,_

 _Alistair and I are leaving for Adamant with the bulk of Not-Knight-Captain Cullen's forces. I'm not sure whether or not I'm hoping to see you there. I would rather you stay in the safety of Skyhold, but then again, Alistair doesn't enjoy keeping score during combat. You keep mumbling my name in your sleep, and I'm not sure why. Can you also feel that unshakable bit of dread hanging in the air? It's supposed to feel wrong, with the Wardens and all, but things are feeling worse than they should. It feels like that moment when I realized that stopping Meredith meant cutting down Fenris, but amplified. Like I'm going to have to go kill an entire fortress full of Fenrises._

 _Now I've gone and made myself sad. But lately that's what I've been doing best._

 _Io_

Absently, Varric traces the small scattered letters in front of him, his brow furrowing. Hawke was not one for talk of impending dread. She had always prided herself on her ability to roll with the punches. But this, Varric squeezes the bridge of his nose, this was something different entirely. He fears for a moment that the culmination of Hawke's anxieties have finally caught up with her, serving to drive her completely over the edge with unexplainable worry. It would certainly explain the mood swings, the push-pull way that she had been treating him lately, _the Wyvern_.

There is a knock at the door, and a scout informs him that Sparky needed him ready and in the courtyard in an hour. Varric tucks the note into his things before he slings his pack over his shoulder. He and Hawke would have time to sort things out after Adamant.


	13. XIII: Wisp

Their siege of Adamant begins in a whirlwind of carnage, only spiraling further out of control once the first Wardens are cut down. The air is heavy with the metallic tang of blood, crackling with the arcane energy of summoned demons. And somewhere, hanging even more heavily over the darkness is the unshakeable feeling that things are just teetering on the edge between bad and worse.

Alistair had felt it lurking on the path behind them as they journeyed to Adamant, causing the hairs on the back of his neck to stand rigidly at attention. He had spent the last night at Skyhold tossing and turning. The nightmares came more frequently now, this much was true, but it hadn't been visions of darkspawn keeping him from a proper night's rest. He can feel her coursing through his veins, the sweet chime of her voice floating over the ever-present song in his tainted blood. _Venus_. He can see her, burning more brilliantly than any object in the night sky of his mind. Feel her cool fingertips ghosting across his lips, her mouth brushing against his ear. _"I've missed you, ma vhenan."_

Even in the midst of the battle, Alistair can feel her, closer than he has felt her in the ten years since their final moments together. He tries to push the thoughts out of his head as he follows the Inquisitor through the wreckage. They have a mission to complete, after all. The fate of the world is at stake. The fate of the Wardens – the very force that had brought them together, the very force that she had risked her life for – is at stake.

But it doesn't stop him from picturing her, a sad smile on her face when she had left him on the battlefield, the words that had always been accompanied by a kitschy gift now ringing sadly in his ears. _"Because I love you, Alistair."_ Running up to the roof of Fort Drakon and finding her lying motionless at the archdemon's feet, her once-warm brown skin cooling rapidly against his own as he held her, howling until his throat was raw and bloody. Visiting her tomb at Weisshaupt, unable to even give her the Dalish burial that she had spoken of, his heart twisting with the thought that he had managed to fail her even in death.

As they make their way further down the wall where Hawke is waiting to meet them, he catches a glimpse of Venus slipping behind a pillar, pausing only to cast a knowing smile at him from over her shoulder.

Alistair knows things are far from over.


	14. XIV: Pride and Sacrifice

Things are only just getting started, and Hawke's stomach drops as she sees Varric running towards her on the battlements. She had spent the long road to Adamant praying to the Maker – something she hadn't done since Mother's death – that the Inquisitor would choose someone else to come to the Approach. But, just as the Chantry had told them, no one was listening, and Varric had shown up anyway ready to fight the good fight.

Hawke's jaw tightens, her fists clenching and unclenching as she follows the Inquisitor through the fortress. _You shouldn't have come_. She casts a nervous glance in Varric's direction. _You should've just stayed at Skyhold._ But Varric can't hear her thoughts, and he can't seem to feel the darkness radiating from the crumbling walls around them.

They manage to find the center of the Warden's activity, arriving in time to see Warden-Commander Clarel slice the throat of another unfortunate sacrifice. The woman is gaunt, her cheeks hollow, a determined pall cast across her face. Erimond stands at her side, his oily sneer twisting with anger at the sight of their fast-approaching party. "Stop them!" He bellows, motioning to the crowd of Wardens standing at attention underneath the balcony. He turns to Clarel, his voice taking on a new sense of urgency. "We must complete the ritual."

Lavellan charges forward, her thick white eyebrows pulled together in a frown. "Clarel, stop! If you complete the ritual, you're doing exactly what Erimond wants!"

"What," Erimond scoffs. "Stopping the blights?" He asks, the sarcasm dripping from his tongue like a poison. "Keeping the world safe from darkspawn? Who wouldn't want that?" He throws out his arms in a mock effort to concede. "And yes, the ritual requires blood sacrifice. Blame me for that if you must. But don't blame the Wardens for doing their duty!"

Hawke notices the murmuring of the Wardens around them, and she can't help but commend Erimond for his strategy. He had taken one of the most distrusted groups in all of Thedas – an apolitical "necessary evil" that was constantly hidden in a shroud of secrecy – and preyed upon their resentment. If there was one thing she had learned from traveling with Alistair, it was that being a Warden was a fairly thankless job. Despite the notoriety that came with the title, boiled down, Wardens were _strange_. And Erimond had capitalized on their desire to be recognized for what they did.

Clarel's voice is solemn. "We make the sacrifices no one else will. Our warriors die proudly," her words are tinted by a hint of bitterness. "For a world that will never thank them."

"And then he binds them to Corypheus," Alistair barks from Hawke's side.

A hush falls over the Wardens, and a Clarel's sallow face pales even further. "Corypheus?" She replies incredulously. "But he's dead."

Erimond steps closer towards her, his face darkening. "These people will say anything to shake your confidence, Clarel."

A flicker of doubt crosses her face, and for a moment Hawke believes that she can sense the danger that they're all in, the dark, hungry energy whipping around them. But just as her faith in Erimond seems to tremble, she closes her eyes, a look of forced determination making its way across her face. "Bring it through." She says shakily.

This is not good. Hawke can feel the stirring of that damned presence from the darkness, feel its sour breath on the back of her neck. "Please," she hears herself croak. "Please, I have seen more than my fair share of blood magic!" She thinks of what that monster did to Mother, of slaying Keeper Marethari in that cave on Sundermount. She thinks of Orsino, desperate to protect his people from Meredith and her Templars, transforming into that, that _thing_ and vanishing before their eyes. "It is never worth the cost." She finishes grimly.

Alistair's approach is one of impatience. "I helped fight the Archdemon in Ferelden. Could you _consider_ listening to me?"

Clarel's mask falters, her eyes flitting uncertainly from their party below the balcony back to Erimond at her side. "Maybe," her shoulders drop as she turns to the magister. "We should consider putting these claims to trial."

His rage is palpable as he takes a menacing step towards her. "Or maybe I should consider bringing in a more reliable ally." He replies threateningly. Erimond rips himself away from Clarel, hurling a barbed look in Fynn's direction. "My master warned me that you might be coming, Inquisitor." He says, banging his staff twice against the ground. "He sent me _this_ to welcome you!"

A deafening roar fills the sky, and Hawke looks up to see a dragon circling over head before it swoops down upon them. It didn't look like any dragon Hawke had ever seen. Its scales were molted, and the flesh appeared to be in a state of perpetual rot. An embodiment of the Blight itself.

As though a blighted dragon were not enough, Hawke feels the ground beneath her feet quake, the rift in the center of the platform crackling to life. Around her, the dread lurking in the shadow quivers – laughing – as a pride demon pushes its monstrous frame through the opening. The blood rushes in Hawke's ears as electricity crackles at its clawed fingertips. Pulling the sword from her back, she grimaces, knowing full well that they hadn't even scratched the surface of what was yet to come.


	15. XV: Here Lies the Abyss

By the time they manage to banish the pride demon, Hawke's eye is swollen and her vision swims with blood. She spits, a metallic tang still coating her tongue, as she staggers over to where Varric is struggling to his feet. She opens her mouth to call to him, but only a wheeze leaves her mouth. Her side is tender. A potential punctured lung from a particularly nasty knock back, after she had shoved Varric away from the demon's stomping feet. But she moves through the pain, ignoring Fynn's cries that she needs to be healed. She needs to see for herself that he is alright.

"Maker's _breath_ , Hawke." Varric says, slinging Bianca over his back. "Why did you do that? That thing could've killed you!" When she mutters something about preserving her pride, he actually glares. "You didn't risk your life for a one-liner. And a terrible one at that." He slings his arm around her, taking on as much of her weight as he can. "Come on, let Sparky heal you so we can find the Warden-Commander."

"I had to," she wheezes. "Think of the story you'll tell. Brave Hawke. Always the hero." If she hadn't been bleeding internally, the words might have come out with the bitterness she meant to put behind them. If she hadn't been bogged down by the remnants of an unending stream of nightmares, she might have actually meant it.

"I expected no less from the Champion of Kirkwall." Seeker Pentaghast – Cassandra – says approvingly as Varric sets her down at Fynn's side. "Perhaps Varric's tales are not so far-fetched after all."

Cole's eyes are cast down. "Lurking in the shadows, hungering for blood. I won't let it win again. Not him too."

Hawke winces as she feels her flesh knitting back together under Fynn's hands. "I think Cole might've taken a blow to the head." She mutters through gritted teeth. Glancing up at Cassandra, she smiles wryly. "And if by 'expected no less,' you mean that I'm just as foolish as you originally thought, I'd say you're right, Seeker. Although, Varric does have a flair for exaggeration."

"Bravery always entails some level of foolishness." She responds, helping Fynn to her feet when the healing is finished. "Although, I will admit that you are shorter than I imagined." Cassandra turns away from Hawke to cast a surprisingly-tender look down at the Inquisitor, her voice softening. "Does that not take too much out of you?"

"S'fine, Cas," she replies, a smile like molasses spreading across her face, a blush creeping up to the tips of her pointed ears. Seemingly rejuvenated by the Seeker's concern, Fynn claps her hands, a shower of sparks raining down from them. "Let's move. We've given the Warden-Commander and her former ally enough of a head start."

Hawke brings up the rear, wincing slightly at the magic still working inside of her system. She looks over to see Alistair staring off into the distance, a look of longing in his eyes. "Alistair," she says loudly, causing him to jump. "Are you alright?" She asks carefully.

"I," he seems uncertain, his eyes straying back to the balcony where Clarel and Erimond had stood. "The Inquisitor is moving without us," he says finally. "Let's go."

He brushes past her without another word, and Hawke decides that she might just have to let this one go. It was this Maker-damned fortress, bringing out the worst in everyone. Although, as she hears Fynn shouting words of encouragement at their party in between calls for the Warden-Commander, she notes that it might just be her and Alistair who were susceptible to whatever dark presence was at work.

Their chase leads them to a showdown between Clarel and a visibly incapacitated Erimond. The Warden-Commander advances, predatory, her staff poised when an ear-splitting roar fills the sky. Corypheus' pet, how could they have forgotten. The dragon lands on the bridge, snapping Clarel up effortlessly in its jaws, its massive head shaking wildly before it throws her to the side. She lands, as limp as a child's rag doll, at their feet – a stark contrast from the proud Warden they had seen only moments before.

"No," Hawke hears herself rasp. Her attention is split between the beast advancing towards them and the beast stirring in its wake. This is it, the moment she had been dreading, the moment that had thrown her so carelessly from sleep back at Skyhold. The tension of her nightmare explodes in a brilliant flash from Clarel's staff. A spark that sends the dragon flailing off of the edge of the bridge, causing the weary stone of the abandoned fortress to crumble in a final show of surrender.

She has had this dream many times before. A vision of falling before a kneejerk response startles her awake. But Hawke knows that this dream has no such end in sight, and she closes her eyes and prepares herself for whatever lies in the abyss below.


	16. XVI: Stranger Things

"Well, this is unexpected."

Alistair's voice causes her eyes to snap open, and she finds herself staring…up? Or – Hawke turns her head to the side, watching as Alistair moves seamlessly across the space above her head. "We were falling." She says slowly, her head spinning as she tries to establish some form of direction. "Is this – are we dead?"

Before anyone can answer, she hears Cole's voice in a crescendo of disbelief. "No, no, no, no, no, _no!_ " His grip tightens on the brim of his hat, and he tugs it further down on his head. "This, this is the Fade, but I'm _stuck_. I can't – why can't I?" The words spew from his mouth without a breath in between them, his eyes widening in unbridled panic. "This place is _wrong_. I make myself forget when I make myself real, but I know it wasn't like this."

Hawke reaches out to him, her hand coming down gently on his bony shoulder. His breath is shaky, coming from the more shallow reaches of his chest. "Breathe, Cole," she murmurs, rubbing gentle circles into the boy's back. As she does so, Hawke takes a look around. The Fade, the last time she was here – "This isn't how I remember it either." She says, glancing briefly at Cole when he shies away from her touch. "Perhaps it's because we're here physically, instead of just dreaming." She turns to Fynn, placing her hands on her hips. "The stories say that you walked out of the Fade at Haven. Was it like this?"

But Fynn shrugs her shoulders, casting a look around that would have been better served on a bored tourist, rather than an interloper in the realm of spirits. "I don't know. I still can't remember the last time I did this."

"Well, whatever happened at Haven, we can't assume we're safe here now." Hawke feels the presence from Adamant growing around them. "That huge demon was right on the other side of that rift Erimond was using."

"It beats sitting around waiting for demons to find us." The Inquisitor agrees with a short nod of her head.

They set out cautiously, and for a moment the only sounds come from their steps and the faraway noises of the Fade's native inhabitants. That is until Varric's voice cuts through the tension. "Is this really what it's like when you dream?" He asks incredulously. "How do you people ever sleep?" Varric leans over and gives Hawke a nudge. "Remember the last time we ended up in the Fade, Hawke?"

"Oh, how could I forget?" She replies dryly. "My closest friends showed such loyalty in the face of a demon's temptations."

"Well, we got better. Sort of."

"We'll see about that." She replies, only half-joking. She doesn't want to think about what horrible things lie ahead, what impossible choices they will have to make. The image of cutting Varric down plays in her head over and over again, and she squeezes her eyes shut in a feeble attempt to chase them away.

Varric places a hand on her arm, offering up a reassuring smile. "No one's turning on anyone this time, Io. We're going to find that demon and get out of here. And then drinks are on me back at Skyhold."

"Wrong, wrong, wrong. Wringing me out. Wrought right and rigid. Can't relax. Can't release." Cole's voice comes is fragmented spurts behind them. His eyes flit wildly from place to place, never remaining in one spot for too long.

Varric glances back. "You doing alright, Kid?"

"You heard what Varric said, right Cole?" Hawke tries to push her own inescapable fears to the side. "We're going to get out of here and run up Varric's tab at the tavern. Everything's going to be fine." The words leave a sour taste in her mouth, and she feels relieved when Fynn takes the reins of reassurance.

Hawke feels like a hypocrite, spouting off feel-good lines that she herself doesn't believe for a minute, trying to pretend that her chest doesn't feel as though it's caving in with the weight of every fear she has ever experienced. As though things cannot appear to get any worse, she looks ahead, past where Fynn is chatting away to Cassandra at the front of the party.

A strangled noise escapes her throat as Alistair inhales sharply. "What? That can't be."

Hawke's knees go weak, and she grabs Varric's shoulder in an attempt to steady herself. Stranger things had only just begun.


	17. XVII: The Next Story

It was a surprise to no one that Varric was always on the hunt for the next story. He was a writer, it was what he did. But staring into the face of Divine Justinia, in the middle of the Fade, Hawke dry heaving next to him – the plot was getting too thick for even him to bear.

"I greet you, Warden." Justinia greets them as though they were arriving in Val Royeaux for some kind of Chantry meet and greet, rather than standing ankle-deep in the Fade. She nods, smiling, at Hawke. "And you, Champion."

Hawke returns her greeting with a sound that reminds Varric of dying nugs, and he squeezes her hand comfortingly. The two weeks in between their night at Skyhold and reconvening at Adamant had left Hawke looking more run down than Varric had ever seen. She had black circles under her eyes, her skin clammy and sallow. Her lips were red, raw where her anxious chewing had left them no room to heal. And her eyes ricocheted in her skull, darting around as though expecting to catch some unseen presence lurking behind them. Even her movements seemed…off. No one would accuse Hawke of being graceful –her fighting style relied on barreling herself and her weapon into the poor bastard she was fighting – but this was different. She was jittery, moving in halting, unsure motions like a skittish animal.

Varric had been bothered by the note she had left him at Skyhold, but ultimately he had decided that it was just a case of increased nerves given the context in which they found themselves. _But this,_ he watches as Hawke takes stuttering breaths in a failing attempt to calm herself down, _this is bad._

"You think my survival impossible. Yet here you stand alive in the Fade yourselves." Justinia says, a response to the Seeker's warnings for caution. "In truth, proving my existence either way would require time we do not have."

"Really?" Hawke rasps, her voice somewhere between a laugh and a bark. Varric realizes that he hasn't seen her this wild since her mother's death. "How hard is it to answer one question? I'm a human, and you are," she trails off, waiting for the Divine to finish.

"I am here to help you." She says simply.

"Maker's tears," Hawke mutters, shaking her head in disbelief. When Varric tries again to offer soothing words, she glares at him. "Don't you try to comfort me. You're eating this up, aren't you? Gathering material for your next book. The tragic former-Champion crumbles in the face of a _new_ hero." The words fly out of her mouth, and she looks just as surprised as he feels when she hears them. Almost immediately, she shakes her head. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean that."

She had said something similar on the roof, hadn't she? Something about saving him for the sake of the story he could tell. _"She couldn't hear the hum, and now none of it was real."_ Cole's voice echoes in his head, and he finally begins to understand what he had meant.

"It is the nightmare you forget upon waking." The Divine's voice cuts through his thoughts. "It feeds off memories of fear and darkness, growing fat upon the terror. The false Calling that terrified the Wardens into making such grave mistakes? Its work."

A number of wisps appear, and Sparky shoots him a cheeky look from behind Cassandra. "Stop flirting with Hawke and help me kill these things, wouldja?"

Varric doesn't miss the look of interest the Seeker throws at him, but he chooses to ignore it. They make short order of the spirits, with Sparky gathering the orbs of concentrated memory that they leave behind. With the last memory collected, a vision explodes before their eyes in a burst of light. Sparky running into the Temple of Sacred Ashes, snowy hair a mess, eyes wide with confusion. _"What's going on here?"_ Justinia knocking the orb out of Corypheus' hand only to have Sparky pick it up, her face contorting in pain as the magic courses through her arm.

"Those," Hawke's voice fills the silence after the memory fades. "Those were Wardens holding the Divine captive." Her voice is tinted with a barely-contained fury.

Alistair looks at her, folding his arms defensively. "Corypheus had already taken their minds. You've seen it yourself, Hawke." When she opens her mouth, he puts up a hand. "We can argue about it after we slay the demon."

"Oh, _intend_ to." She replies venomously. They continue on, the sound of splashing water echoing around them. Hawke chews the inside of her cheek, her gaze steely. "This Nightmare sounds dangerous." She says finally to no one in particular.

This sets the Kid off again. "It's nothing like me." Cole says, in a way that makes Varric unsure of whether he is trying to convince the party or himself. "I make people forget to help them. It eats their fears. I don't know if I could do that. But I don't. I don't want to. That's not me."

Varric looks up to see Hawke looking at Cole with a tenderness that didn't match up with the haggard look she had developed. She looks to Varric, giving a quick nod in Cole's direction, her eyebrows raised in a silent request. "Relax, Kid." He says softly. "I don't imagine anybody seeing much of you in the Nightmare." When Cole's rigid shoulders relax, he continues. "Sounds like it preys on fear. Stealing people's memories. That's low, even for a demon. Memories make us what we are. A monster that takes them away? I don't want to think about that."

"Ah," a rich voice fills the air around them. "We have a visitor. Some foolish little girl comes to steal the fear I kindly lifted from her shoulders. You should have thanked me and left your fear where it lay, forgotten. You think that pain will make you stronger? What fool filled your mind with such drivel? The only one who grows stronger from your fears is _me_."

Varric hears Hawke's breath hitch in her throat, and when he looks up he sees that her face has paled, a look of grim recognition in her eyes.

"But you are a guest here in my home," it continues. "So by all means, let me return what you have forgotten."

Sparky raises her staff in time to strike an approaching shade. "How thoughtful, more demons." She says flatly.

As he fires Bianca, Varric hears the voice of the Nightmare in his ears, its words wrapping around his brain. "Once again Hawke is in danger because of you, Varric." It purrs. "You found the red lyrium. You brought Hawke here."

"Just keep talking, smiley." He mutters, glancing around. But no one else appears to have heard it, and Varric begins to feel queasy. He already _knows_ that it's his fault, despite the fact that Hawke has always been quick to tell him otherwise. But Varric knows that without the lyrium, without the idol, without _The Tale of the Champion_ ; Hawke wouldn't be here, ass-deep in demons, looking like she had died four days ago.

"Varric," Hawke's voice catches his attention, and he looks up to see her blood-soaked and wild-eyed. "If the _Swords and Shields_ reboot doesn't work out, you can always take a stab at horror stories." She chuckles darkly at her own joke, yanking her sword from the demon's chest, before turning and heading further down the path.

Varric knows that he won't be able to talk himself out of this one.


	18. XVIII: Warden, oh Warden

The demons keep on coming, the Divine is not the Divine, and Hawke and Alistair are fighting again. "What we do know is that the mortal Divine perished at the Temple, thanks to the Grey Wardens." She says haughtily, shooting a glare in Alistair's direction.

He frowns. "What, again?" Folding his arms tightly across his chest, he fires back. "It wasn't their fault. We can debate the depressing details when we get back to Adamant."

"Ah yes, Adamant." Hawke replies sarcastically. "Where the Inquisition faces an army of demons raised by – tell me, Alistair, who raised them?" When he doesn't answer, she nods. "Oh right, they were raised by the Wardens."

"So what – what're you saying?" His dark eyes narrow. "Terrible actions are only justified when they're _your_ terrible actions?" Alistair throws his hands up. "You tore Kirkwall apart and started the mage rebellion!"

"To protect innocent mages!" Hawke erupts. "Not madmen drunk on blood magic!" She rolls her eyes. "But you'd ignore that, because you can't imagine a world without the Wardens. Even if that's what we need!"

Hawke knows she's being harsh, knows that she's being unreasonable even. After all, the Wardens were the only thing standing between her sister's life and death in the Deep Roads. The Wardens were the only people who could stop Blights and sense darkspawn. She respected the Wardens, respected Alistair. But she feels the gnawing in her brain, the one that only served to encourage her lashing out at innocent parties. So she ignores the wounded look in Alistair's eyes, forcing herself to remain a poison.

"The blood sings softly." Cole says. "It never stops. And then it's all they hear. We can't let them hurt more people."

"Oh, and who asked you?" Alistair snaps sharply.

Hawke gives him a shove. "You leave Cole out of this. He's done nothing wrong to you."

Before things can escalate, Fynn is pushing herself between them. "That's enough!" She says, in a more assertive tone than Hawke has ever heard her muster. "This debate can wait until we're out of danger. Alright?" She looks at Hawke pointedly, her crimson eyes glinting.

Hawke watches as Fynn returns to the front of the party, waiting for Alistair to brush past her (glaring as he does so) before she follows at what feels like a safe distance. She can feel Varric's pitying gaze burning sympathetic holes into the side of her head, and she knows how this must look. Unhinged Hawke, changing moods like a spring breeze, lashing out at people who want to help. She feels sick. Hawke knows it's the Fade, it's that damned Nightmare whispering her insecurities unceasingly in her own mind. That's how it had been for weeks, but she hadn't expected it to get this far. To wear her down so quickly.

"I don't know how to stop myself, Varric." She says quietly, her eyes cemented on Alistair's back in front of her. "These thoughts, this anger – I don't know how to keep it contained."

"We're going to get out of here." He replies, the quiet determination of his tone wrapping around her like a blanket. "Just you wait, Hawke. We're getting out of here."

Alistair sneaks glances at his side, making sure that she is still with him, each time fearing that she is gone. Venus, perpetually barefoot, shooting him crooked glances when he meets her eye. He cannot focus on the task at hand. He cannot focus on arguments with Hawke. All he can focus on is her, his Venus, once again at his side.

He thinks he must be going mad. She had been dead for ten years, and if the spirit impersonating the Divine has shown him anything, it is that nothing was certain when dealing with the Fade. And yet, he knows it is neither spirit nor demon that walks next to him. Venus had come back to him, and he would ensure that they remained together.

Forever this time.

Varric had always said that the hero never makes it out of their story alive, and Hawke had been playing hero for far too long. It had finally caught up with her, in the monstrous form standing in front of them. Hawke sees Carver's broken body lying somewhere between Lothering and the Korcari Wilds, his eyes dull, staring at her accusingly. She sees her mother, stitched together like a torn doll, shuffling sadly in a body that is not her own. Hawke can hear the Nightmare, louder now that it is right in front of her, its voice a static overwhelming her senses.

Hawke knows she won't make it out of the Fade alive, despite Varric's constant murmurs of reassurance. She feels it in her bones, the twisting in her stomach – Nightmare's hold. She feels it in her shaky movements, the weight of her sword in her hands (something she had never noticed before) as she cuts through each newly emerging fear. It has nothing to do with Alistair, the Wardens, or even Corypheus. Watching as Fynn raises her staff, a lightning strike bursting from its crystal and hitting the Nightmare in front of them, Hawke realizes that her tenure as hero is over. There was simply no more room for her at the table.

Alistair fights with a ferocity that he has not felt since the Battle of Denerim. The fearlings scuttle towards him only to taste the cool steel of his blade, and the occasional wood of his shield.

He had never thought that he would welcome death. It wasn't as though he feared it – his time in the Wardens had taught him that death was inevitable, an inescapable whisper in your blood luring you down to the Deep Roads. He had thought about the death of a martyr after Duncan's passing, wishing that he would have had the opportunity to give his life in return. Venus had given him a new reason to live, had given him something to look forward to. But after Denerim, when he realized that they would not be married and churning out armfuls of fat Elven babies, he had lost it all. The fight to live or die had evaporated, and he simply _was_.

But _now_ , he even chuckles as he cuts another fearling down, a surge of adrenaline pumping through his veins. He feels alive, he feels like he can take on an entire army of Nightmares. He hears her voice, like the tune of his favorite song. "Don't do this, Alistair. Please don't do this."

As wrong as it feels, he ignores her. Alistair is ready to die.

The demon crumples in a heap of shrieking flesh, the sound piercing the very fabric of the Fade itself. Though its minion is slain, the Nightmare is far from over. "Go," I say. "You have to go _now_!" A rift in the distance, closing quickly.

Hesitation, a look of pity. The words coming harsher now. " _Go!_ Or you've damned us all!" A retreating form through the Rift, out of the Fade, out of the danger. A warmth I haven't felt in years. Is this what it feels like to truly be at peace?

With a bone-chilling shriek, Fear descends upon me, and everything explodes into light.


	19. XIX: A Promise, Unfulfilled

They burst through the rift with seconds to spare, just a few moments ahead of Sparky, Hawke, and Alistair. Varric lands hard on the stone, his shoulder cracking unpleasantly underneath him. But it doesn't matter. Nothing matters, because they survived. They are out of the Fade and things are going to be different. His first priority is fixing the mess that never should've been, making it clear to Hawke that she wasn't just a fun story to tell. Making it clear that he couldn't survive without her.

The rift crackles, sparks of arcane energy flying as the murmurs of the crowd fills the air. Varric knows that they are waiting on Sparky. To the remaining Wardens she represents the possibility of redemption, and to the Inquisition forces she is a physical reminder of their faith in what they're doing. But Varric is waiting for Hawke, and he feels his chest flutter lightly as the rift comes back to life in a flash of light.

She stands triumphant, closing the rift and banishing the last of the demons with a flick of her wrist. The fray erupts into a fit of cheers. The Herald of Andraste, returned from the Fade once more. Varric couldn't have painted a more heroic image if he had tried. His head swims with anticipation, and a mild annoyance at the crowd now converging around its Inquisitor. He is pushed out to the edges of the crowd, unable to see over the sea of heads in front of him.

He hears Sparky's voice, muffled by the blood pounding in his own ears. He pictures Hawke at the Inquisitor's side – exhausted but content – in desperate need of a cold ale and a warm blanket. Determined to be the one to give these things to her and more, Varric pushes through the crowd, a grin splitting his face as he finally reaches the front.

Sparky stands at attention, a grim pall overtaking her typically relaxed face. Varric sees Alistair at her side, his eyes bloodshot and weary. But –

"Where's Hawke?" He hears himself ask. He looks around, half-expecting her to jump out and surprise him. He refuses to note the look of unease shared between Sparky and Alistair, refuses to acknowledge the growing pit in his stomach. Varric's mouth is dry, and there is a hollow ache throbbing in his throat. "Where's Hawke?" He repeats, his voice strangled.

"Varric, I," Sparky falters, her words hesitant. "Hawke sacrificed her life. To stop Corypheus." But even she doesn't sound convinced, and her tone is almost apologetic.

Varric refuses to believe it, his mind still full of promises that would never be fulfilled. "Well," he begins, unsure of what to say. It wasn't supposed to end up this way. He had dragged her into danger once again, but things were never supposed to end up this way. Sparky reaches out, his name on the tip of her tongue, but he recoils from her touch. He walks away before the tears can fall.


	20. XX: Death of a Martyr

Falon'Din, friend of the dead. Fynn would listen to the stories told by clan Lavellan's hahren while curled up in her mother's lap, wondering if it was truly possible to be a friend to the dead. Wondering if it was truly possible to find the light in such darkness.

To say she fears death is an understatement.

She feels the ice in her veins, the remnants of the Fade stuck to every fiber of her being as they venture back to Skyhold from Adamant. She cannot close her eyes without seeing Hawke standing, her back ramrod straight, staring the demon down with a fire that Fynn had only pretended to carry.

 _Alistair draws his sword, his eyes practically dancing. "You were right, Hawke. The Wardens caused this mess. A Warden must –"_

 _"A Warden must help them rebuild. That's your job. Corypheus is mine." She looks at him gently, a far cry from the anger Fynn had seen when stepping in between their argument. "Alistair, it isn't time. You know it isn't time."_

 _"What about Varric?" A hint of desperation creeps into his voice. "You can't leave things like this. She – she is already gone, Hawke. This is my one chance. This is my one chance to see her again. I won't let you," His voice breaks. "You can't take this away from me."_

 _Fynn has felt like an interloper since arriving in Haven, and this moment is no different. She averts her eyes, looking bashfully down at the ground as Hawke places a hand against Alistair's cheek._

 _"She wouldn't want to meet you like this." She says quietly. Clearing her throat, she places a firm hand on Fynn's shoulder. "Inquisitor. Fynn." When she looks up, Hawke's eyes are warm. "Say goodbye to Varric for me. Tell him," her eyes pool with tears, and for the first time since they had met, Hawke gives her a genuine smile. It sends a sharp pain shooting through Fynn's chest. "Tell him that I love him. Tell him that I'm sorry it took so long. Please," she is letting go of her shoulder, pushing her towards the rift. "Please tell him that."_

"Cas, am I a murderer?" Her head is pressed against Cassandra's back, arms tight around her middle. Somewhere between Adamant and Val Firmin, Fynn had almost fallen off the back of Noodles the Hart. Cas had seen it fit to take over, passing her own mount onto an Inquisition scout.

"We have taken the lives of many, yes. And we have also saved many." Cassandra replies matter-of-factly. "But if you are asking me if you personally murdered the Champion," she takes one hand off the reins briefly to squeeze Fynn's own. "Then no, I would not consider you a murderer." When Fynn suppresses a sob, pressing her face further into Cassandra's back, the Seeker adds. "If you're going to be sick again, please let me know so that I may actually stop the Hart this time."

She sniffles loudly, dragging her arm across her face. "Varric hates me. You saw how he looked at me." She sees his face in her head, pinpointing the precise moment when his heart shattered at the sound of her voice. "What if he leaves the Inquisition? Who's going to come up with fun ways to kill Corypheus with me? Or think of different nicknames to call all the Orlesian shems back at Skyhold?"

"Varric doesn't hate you." Cassandra replies patiently. "I've all but wrung that little bastard's neck, and he still doesn't hate me." When Fynn argues that Cassandra didn't murder the woman who loved him, she sighs. "He's lost someone dear to him. He may blame you if he needs to, but you are not the enemy here. Hawke's death came at the hands of Corypheus, and Varric knows this." Her tone softens. "He'll need time, Fynn. We should at least give him that."

Fynn brushes her fingers along the crimson vallaslin etched into her face. She had always wondered why she had been branded with the mark of June, the god of craft, if Falon'Din's story had been such an integral part of her childhood. But now, mourning the loss of a woman who she knew from legend and the potential loss of a friend's trust, she concludes that she is no friend of the dead.


	21. XXI: Well, Shit

His days bleed together like watercolors. He tells stories to Sparky in Skyhold's foyer, the words hollow in his own ears. He writes letters to everyone back in Kirkwall and abroad, stray tears dripping from the tip of his nose and blurring the ink on the pages. He stares into his mug at the Herald's Rest, thinking of Hawke's dark-ale skin, warm and flushing under his fingertips.

Varric doesn't eat, doesn't sleep, doesn't even play Wicked Grace with Ruffles.

Instead, he lies curled up in his bed, staring at the wall, his hand tracing absent circles into the surface of the pillow where Hawke had rested her head. He wants to scream, wants to throw a fit in a decidedly un-Varric way. The voice of the Nightmare plays incessantly inside of his head. _"Once again Hawke is in danger because of you, Varric. You brought Hawke here."_ He grips the pillow tightly, clenching his jaw while he waits for the pain to subside. But it doesn't go anywhere, just grows hotter inside of his stomach until he feels the anger bubbling up his throat. _She had been right,_ he thinks bitterly. _None of this would've happened if she had never met me._

"Varric."

He doesn't roll over until he feels the bed sink slightly. Sparky sits at the foot of the mattress, her hair wild and her face smudged with dirt. She fidgets awkwardly, her fingers flexing in her lap. "We missed you in the Fallow Mire." She tells him after a long silence. "You would've loved it. Or, maybe not, because it's just a big swamp full of corpses. And we had to fight an Avvar warrior. I got a pretty good knock in the head, but we found our missing scouts."

Varric doesn't move. He doesn't even feign an interest. Things had been cool with Sparky since Adamant. He knows that it wasn't her fault, that she didn't push Hawke into the jaws of the demon. He can practically see the scene unfold in his mind. Hawke had probably chased them out of the Fade, demanding that she be sacrificed if it meant saving their lives. It was the same way she had stuck her neck out for the Bone Pit miners. The same way she stood up to the Arishok. The same way she had thrown her reputation away for Blondie's sake. For a minute he hates her for it, that hopelessly good nature.

"Varric." Sparky says again, her voice wavering. "I just spoke to Josephine, and they've set a date for the ball in Halamshiral, and I'd really like it if you went with me." She pauses, waiting for him to react. When he doesn't, she continues. "It's in a month, so we have time to prepare. But I already have it planned. You, me, Cole, and Cas. We'll show those nobles how to really throw a party!" She hesitates. "Doesn't – doesn't that sound like fun?"

She's trying, painfully hard, and he sighs. "Not really, Sparky, no."

"We can make it fun!" She scooches closer. "You've been cooped up here since," she stops herself and rephrases the sentence. "You've been at Skyhold for a while now, Varric. I know that it's a fortress, but you could afford to have some adventure. A room full of shems doesn't sound that great, I know, but we can make it work!"

He stares at the ceiling, his eyes straying to a knothole in one of the planks that he's never noticed before. "Hawke died thinking that I took her for granted." He says flatly, folding his hands on his stomach. "She died thinking that I kept her around to use in my stories, and I am never going to get the chance to make that right." Varric turns his head, meeting Sparky's eyes for the first time since she came in. "So you can see why 'a room full of shems' isn't my biggest concern right now."

"Oh Varric," she fumbles for the words, wringing her hands together. "I, I didn't know just when I should tell you. You seemed like you wanted to talk when I got back, but then Cas told me that I should give you space. I didn't know when would be the _appropriate_ time to tell you about it, and then you've been locking yourself in here, and you know how Blackwall is always telling me about when is and is not the right time to poke my nose into things." She flinches in the middle of her ramble, as though she is worried that he'll strike her. "Hawke told me – in the Fade – she told me to tell you., and I didn't. I didn't say anything."

"What?" His blood pounds in his ears and he sits up. "Tell me what, Sparky? She told you to tell me what?" When she just starts rambling apologetically, he snaps his fingers. "I need you to focus. What did Hawke tell you?"

"She said to tell you that she loves you." Sparky blurts out before cupping her face bashfully. She actually looks like she might cry. "She loves you and she's sorry that it took so long."

Time seems to stand still around him, and Varric hears himself laugh. Not at all happily, but it is still a laugh. Sparky winces at the noise. "Perfect, that's perfect." He wheezes, his body racking with something caught between a dry-heaving sob and more laughter. He feels her arms around him and he crumples. "She's always had the shittiest timing." He says, the tears soaking into her robes. "I don't know why I'm surprised."

"I guess this isn't the best time to give you this, then." She mumbles, trying to slip something back into her pack.

Varric takes it from her hands, wiping roughly at his eyes. An envelope, addressed to him in Bianca's handwriting.

Well, shit.


	22. XXII: It's Worth a Shot

Cole watches Varric when he writes, and it has been some time since Varric has written. He is quieter inside, the hum a ghost of what it had been. Cole watches the pen move slowly, pained, against the parchment, Varric's face twisting into a mask of grief before he finally sets it down.

Cole wants to help, wants to untangle the knots tying in Varric's heart, just like Varric had helped him. He feels the weight of Bianca in his hands, the unease pooling in his belly as he stared the Templar down, the sour taste in the back of his mouth when he realized that it hadn't made him feel any better. Varric's warm voice soothing him as they made camp on the way back to Skyhold, his eyes faraway, his tone laced with sadness.

 _"Kid," he says softly, over the crackle of the fire. "Cole, you were able to_ hear _Hawke before," he pauses. A tremor in his voice. Her laugh in his ears. "You heard Hawke's thoughts when we were outside of Crestwood." A hint of desperation, the sound makes Cole sad. "There's got to be something that you can feel, right? Some bit of her still left?"_

 _Cole stares up into the cloudy skies above their heads. He wants to say something reassuring, something that doesn't make everyone uncomfortable or embarrassed. He wants to tell Varric that Hawke was warm, like fresh bread from the oven and sitting in the sunlight. He wants to tell him that she had finally heard the hum as she charged towards the demon, she heard it and it made her cry the type of tears that Varric had always kissed away when they spent lazy days in bed, far away from the world around them. The kind of tears that came from laughing too hard, or thinking about their lives together. Tears that had tasted as sweet as her father's plum jam on the tip of her tongue, the light exploding in her chest as she raised the sword above her head – right before Cole had felt a horrible chill that shot through him like one of Sera's arrows. A chill that he had been trying will himself to forget since they had returned from Adamant._

 _Cole doesn't say anything for a long time, and Varric doesn't push him._

There is a knock at the door, and an Inquisition scout pokes his head in. "Varric, there's someone here to see you. She's waiting in the main hall."

A flurry of images splashes across Cole's mind. Late nights bent over workshop tables, her fingers dotted with small scars, sneaking away from her family for thirty minutes of heaven in the nearest closet. He watches as Varric straightens his papers, tucking them into a drawer in the writing desk before he glances back at Cole.

"You staying in here, Kid?" He asks.

Cole is sitting cross-legged on Varric's bed, careful to avoid the unkempt side that the older man has not touched since after Adamant. He nods, tracing circles into the comforter. Varric leaves, the door closing softly behind him, and Cole begins his search.

Hawke's pack sits, untouched, by the bedroom door. As though it is waiting for its owner to return from a long day of training. Cole hears Alistair as he approaches it.

 _"I thought you should have this," he tells Varric solemnly._

 _Cole hears the words Alistair won't say. The ones that will tell Varric that he has been there before, that the hurt never really goes away. He sees the weariness in Alistair's eyes. Another woman he had respected sacrificed for a cause that was bigger than she should have ever been._

Cole stoops down, regarding the pack with a look that borders on reverence. He doesn't know how it should work. The hurt had always just come to him, as naturally as the thoughts inside of his own head. He never had to work to find them. But he thinks of Hawke, chewing silently on her bread in the kitchen, a smudge of jam on the corner of her mouth. He thinks of Hawke, her hands calloused and warm on his back, burning through the chill of the Fade. He thinks of Hawke, lost somewhere beyond their reach, the light in her eyes and Varric's hum in her chest.

Cole reaches into the pack, pulling out the first of Hawke's possessions that he can get a hold on, and leaves the chamber with it clasped tightly against his chest. He doesn't know how it should work. The thoughts had always just come to him, as naturally as the thoughts inside of his own head. But for Hawke's sake, he is willing to try.


	23. XXIII: A Pain I'm Used to

Varric tries to focus through the dull throbbing in his chest.

"I appreciate the warning," he says, staring sternly down at the hooded figure in front of him. "But you shouldn't have come yourself. What if the guild found out? Or whatshisname?" _Bogdan_ , he thinks, _your husband, Bogdan. What would he think if he knew you were here? And how many assassins would your family send after me?_

Bianca smiles at him. "Are you worrying about me? Or yourself?" One copper eyebrow quirks coyly, and he idly tries to remember how many times he had fallen victim to that coquettish look.

"A little of column A, a little of column B." he replies dryly. "I am the expendable one, after all."

"Aww," she replies, patting his cheek in a show of mock sympathy. "Don't worry, I'll protect you. We'll just have to," her eyes flit to the side, and she steps back, folding her arms. "Well, this is a surprise. You're the Inquisitor, right? Bianca Davri, at your service."

Sparky looms over them, her eyes narrowed slightly. "Your name is Bianca?" She asks without returning Bianca's greeting, a decidedly un-Sparky-like move. Varric wonders what he has done to catch her in a moment of uncharacteristic hostility, and he feels the sweat bead on his forehead as she eyes them suspiciously.

"It's a common name," Bianca replies, her tone equally as guarded. "Half the girls in the merchant's guild are named Bianca. The other half are named Helga. I lucked out." She gives a shrug and a smile, one that Sparky doesn't return.

"I take it you're a friend of Varric's?" She replies, the look on her face bearing an eerie resemblance to the Seeker's.

This is not how Varric had imagined this scene playing out. He had expected Bianca to send a liaison, and for Sparky to gleefully go along with the plan as she did every other one. This was just _torturous_.

"Who isn't a friend of Varric's?" Bianca replies nonchalantly. "You _have_ met him before, right?"

"Obviously I've met him before," she snaps as Varric gives her a nudge. Sparky shoots him a look. "Why do you both look like cats that got into the cream?"

"She's taken a huge risk coming here herself." He says, trying to make a case for Bianca. He had seen Sparky put on a better show for Orlesian nobles, why should this be any worse? Was there some sort of Dalish, anti-Dwarf sentiment he didn't know about? "Maybe for both of us," he finishes, hoping that she'll see the direness of the situation they're in.

But this would, of course, require Bianca to also acknowledge the direness of the situation they're in. And her sparking laugh tells Varric that this is not the case. "You're such a worrier!" She says, patting him on the back. "There's a giant hole in the sky. I think the Merchant's Guild has bigger things to think about."

"I closed the hole in the sky." Sparky mumbles, folding her arms defensively.

Varric speaks over them both, trying to reintroduce some danger into the conversation. "Bianca's got a lead on where Corypheus got his red lyrium." This seems to peak Sparky's interest, and he nods as her eyes widen.

"The site of Bartrand's folly, the thaig Varric found, has been leaked. There's a deep roads entrance crawling with strange humans carting out red lyrium by the handful."

Sparky smothers her look of interest, choosing to snark instead. "If it's such a secret, how do you know about it, Bianca?"

Varric rubs the back of his neck. "I told her."

"Of course you did." She mutters under her breath.

"Right after the expedition," he continues. "I wrote and told Bianca about what we found." If looks could kill, Varric would've been lying dead at Sparky's feet before she had even walked over. He tries to defend himself, though from what he doesn't know. "I had artifacts that needed buyers, and she had more contacts that would pay for them. Plus, I owed her." He looks up at her. "Please, Sparky, you know this is important."

Varric sees the agreement in her eyes. It's begrudging, but it's there. "After Halamshiral." She replies flatly, forcing herself to remain stony and unhelpful. "We'll go then."

"Sounds like a plan, Inquisitor." Bianca replies, her voice syrupy sweet. "Before I go," she turns to him, taking on a more sincere approach. "Varric, I heard about Hawke. I know she was a close friend, and I'm here for you." There is something hidden in her tone, something that brings him back to late nights in her workshop, her skin slick with sweat and her eyes burning with longing. She had been there for him then, too.

Varric watches her go, the ache strengthening in his chest, before he turns to glare up at Sparky. "What was that about?" He demands. "You all but set her hair on fire."

"Oh, believe me. That was coming." She snaps. When he asks her why she's so suspicious, she frowns. "When I lived with my clan, there was a halla who I knew was up to no good. He just had this way about him, strutting all over the camp like he was keeper. Sure enough, we once found him eating shirts off of a clothesline. Bianca is like that halla."

Varric stares at her, with her messy hair and bruised lips (products of an afternoon of "training" with Cassandra, he assumes), dead-serious as she compares Bianca to a clothes-eating animal. He snorts, the snort becoming a chuckle, becoming a bark of laughter, until he is doubled over and wheezing, clutching the table for support.

"Stop laughing at me!" She replies through a fit of giggles of her own. "That halla was bad news! He ate through an entire pile of the hahren's small clothes." She wipes a tear from the corner of her eye, looking down at him seriously. "I just don't want you to get hurt." She pauses, "more than you've already been, I mean." Sparky holds up her hands. "And I know it's meddling, and you know Bianca, and she won't eat your breeches, but still."

He opens his mouth to respond, but his eyes meet Cole's from behind her shoulder. "Why is he holding a dirty sock?" He asks instead, causing Sparky to turn.

"Do you," she can't get the words out through her laughter. "Do you think he's going to eat it?"

Varric snorts, waving Cole over, the ache in his chest, slowly but surely, beginning to recede.


	24. XXIV: Think of Me Fondly

Varric tugs at the collar of his formal uniform. "I don't know how I let you convince me to put this thing on." He says, eyeing Sparky from across the carriage.

"I started crying, and you agreed to come with us." She replies simply, allowing Cassandra to run her fingers through the tuft of hair on the top of her head in an attempt to tame it. "Comb all you want, Cas. It's not going to go down." When Dorian offers her some pomade, she makes a face. "And walk in all oily? No thank you."

"No offense, Sparkler," Varric says, giving Dorian a nod. "But I thought that Cole was coming with us."

"He's busy with the sock." Sparky says, resting her head against the Seeker's shoulder. "It's important to him, so I didn't push him. I just wish there was something I could do." She mimics Cole's wispy voice. "'Friend of the dead, a title you always wanted. You're a necromancer; you should be able to help.'" Sparky sighs heavily. "But I only do things with corpses." This earns a snort from Dorian, and she reddens. "Do things _to_ corpses!" When this makes him laugh harder, she sits up straight. "I don't have Hawke's corpse, so I can't help, is what I'm trying to say!"

"Maker's breath, Sparky," Varric can't help but smile when she looks at him bashfully. "Anyway, the Kid is taking Hawke's," he stops himself, unable to say it out loud. Hawke's death. "He's taking it a little hard, and if this is what he needs to do to cope, then let him." Varric shakes his head. "Even if that means carting around one of her dirty socks in an attempt to hear her thoughts."

His thoughts drift as Sparky changes the subject by asking Dorian to teach her Tevene. It was almost impossible to imagine that Hawke had been gone for a little over three months. Time hadn't ceased to move, the earth hadn't ceased to exist, and Varric found himself slowly clawing his way out of the funk he had been in since Adamant. He knows that if he had been able to dream, she would've been waiting for him there. Still, even without that luxury, he had found himself talking to her throughout the day. Internally, but still chatting away nonetheless. It becomes his favorite way to pass the time on particularly long walks, when Sparky's attention is wrapped up in the Seeker, and Cole is busy murmuring to Hawke's belongings.

( _I'm fairly certain there's a hole in that one. Do you think he'll stitch it up for me?_ )

Varric, following his introduction to the court, wanders the gardens of the Winter Palace looking for a place to station himself for the evening. Sparky had promised him a night of fun, and so far, he was actually enjoying himself. The food was top-notch, the booze free-flowing, and some guests had even read his work. Even the critics had begrudgingly admitted to enjoying most of it.

( _Yes, they're well-read. But for Andraste's sake, Varric, they're_ Orlesian _._ )

He chuckles to himself, trying to picture Hawke navigating the room in a poofy tulle gown, balancing on pointed heels. He watches as a woman pauses to pull her heel free from where it had gotten stuck in the soft-earth of the garden, and he snorts.

( _That's what you get for choosing fashion over function._ )

"Having fun, Varric?"

He glances up to see Sparky looming over him, a twig caught in her hair. As he reaches up to fish it out for her, he shrugs. "My brother used to throw galas like this back in Kirkwall. I always tried to avoid them. I'm not much of a dancer these days."

( _I always heard that blood mages dance naked under the moonlight. Doesn't that sound like fun?_ )

"When Hawke and I used to dance, she would spin me until I threw up." He adds, shaking his head at the memory. "There was usually drinking involved."

"It's still pretty early, I wouldn't rule it out."

He chuckles. "You can spin the Seeker. I'd pay to watch that." The image of Sparky spinning Cassandra to the point of being sick is something that Varric actually _would_ pay to see, and he lets out another laugh. He feels a warmth pooling in his chest, a feeling that he hasn't felt in quite some time. "I'll be here keeping an eye out, Sparky. Let me know what you find."

"On it, Boss," she says, throwing him an exaggerated wink before bouncing off.

 _That bundle of moonlight is going to save the world_ , he thinks warmly.

( _I just wish I would've been there to see it._ )


	25. XXV: Get Me Away from Here, I'm Dying

Varric hasn't seen so many drunk and happy faces since they had closed the Breach at Haven. His chest feels tight – in the best of ways – his heart hammering in his chest. Part of him assumes that it is relief that has sent his heartbeat into overdrive. Sparky had somehow pulled off a public truce with Celene, Gaspard, _and_ Briala. They hadn't had to kill as many people as they thought they would. And even the Seeker had managed to shake the scowl off her face long enough for her drunken Inquisitor to ply her with punch. _So it's no surprise that you should feel giddy with relief, right?_

But there's something else. He feels it as he stares out over the balcony, his face warm with a liquor-induced flush, and his chest burning with the hum of some unspoken promise. He tries to cut through his own boozy fog, tries to summon Hawke's voice to soothe his quickening thoughts. But instead of gentle words, he finds only image after image, flashing through his brain in an explosion of color. Hawke in Hightown, slipping coins into the hands of a would-be thief. Hawke arranging flowers in Bartrand's room in the sanitarium, always staying when Varric would not. Hawke lying naked beside him, bathed in moonlight, crooked smile on her face.

Varric grips the banister, his knuckles growing white.

 _I need to see her._ His thoughts are wild, his heart threatening to beat right out of his chest.

 _I need to see her._

 _I need to_

 _I need to get out of here._

Her eyes open to an unending darkness, and she struggles to remember where she is. The Fade, the Nightmare, and then – _Is this the Void?_ She never thought that the Void would smell so putrid, like taking Varric "dancing" after Wicked Grace. Hawke reaches for her sword, clawing in the darkness until her fingertips find the cool metal of its handle. Every nerve in her body screams in agony, as though she is being set on fire over and over and over again.

 _That's right_. She twists, contorting herself in the tight space in an attempt to get a better grip on her weapon. _It thought it broke me, but I wouldn't give it the satisfaction._ The surface under her stomach is slimy, like lying in a pit of slugs. She presses herself further into it, her arms outstretched in front of her.

All is silent, save for the faraway sound of the beast's easy breathing. Her fingers curl around the handle, her chest burning with a song she had killed herself to hear. And what a beautiful sound it was. She hums to herself, a smile on her lips, pulling painfully at her scorched skin. The sword is heavy in her hands, the song light in her heart. She squeezes her eyes shut and prays for the best.

 _Always so reckless_ , she thinks, the scream filling her ears as she forces the blade even further down. _Never truly understanding the danger until you find yourself. Trapped in the belly of the beast._

 _The belly of the beast,_ he thinks as he stares up into the ornate carvings on the ceiling. _Guests of the Winter Palace, right after a string of assassination attempts._ Varric yawns, his clumsy fingers struggling to undo the last of the buttons on his jacket. It isn't the most dangerous place he has ever spent the night.

"You said you loved me," he says out loud, catching himself off guard. "You said you love me, and then you died." Varric stares accusingly at the ceiling, waiting for Hawke to say something back. It is the first time he's been able to get himself to say the words, and they leave a sour taste inside of his mouth. "Hawke is dead." He says again, feeling the corners of his lips pulling down. "Hawke is dead, and she loves me."

Sniffling, Varric rubs his hand under his nose, flicking away any stray tears in the process. He had always known that she had felt that way, had never needed to hear the words out loud. He had always thought that feeling it was enough.

 _I knew she needed time. Good with affection, bad with words – that's just how she was._ He groans, wondering why tonight's mood was sad drunk. _Always running. Running from me, running from her feelings, running, running_

 _Running._

Her feet are clumsy, her muscles severely weakened, her tendons snapping in protest. But she runs. She had cut and cut and cut until she saw the light, until it had exploded in a blinding flash right before her eyes. Falling down and crashing hard upon the ground, only to raise her sword once more. If there was one thing that she had learned from the Arishok, it was that no fight could be won from running behind pillars. The only way to do things was to face them head-on.

 _"You just have to be louder."_ Cole had told her back in Skyhold. And this time, she had made her voice known. Hawke had howled, and cut, and howled, and cut until her throat bled and her arms crumbled under the weight of her weapon, refusing to stop until the demon's massive head was a bloody stump at her feet.

And now, she runs. Blindly, the blood pooling in her vision, her legs screaming in protest, skin raw against the air whipping around her. But she knows where she is going. The hum burns in her chest, song blaring in her ears as the tears run down her cheeks.

 _I'm coming home. I'm coming home._

 _Home, it's too early to start heading home_.

Varric grunts as he hears Sparky's voice cutting through his slumber, the sound grating against his already-aching head. He had ended the night in a drunken stupor, and now he was being woken up in a hungover nightmare. "Sparky, it's still dark out." He mutters, rolling onto his side away from her pawing hands. "Wake me up in an hour."

"We gotta _go_!" She gives him a pull, yanking on one of his nipples in the process.

He yelps, smacking her hands away as he sits up. "Alright, al _right_. Maker's tears, I have never seen you," Varric trails off when he gets a look at her. He had been expecting the Sparky who was willing to drag them out of camp at sunrise to explore whatever end of Thedas they found themselves in that week. Instead, he finds himself looking at a Sparky who looks as hungover as he feels, her eyes swollen and her lips dry. "You look terrible." He tells her. "And I saw you when you crawled out of the wreckage at Haven."

"Varric, we have to go." She says, her tone serious. Grave even. He doesn't like the look in her eyes.

Varric tries to joke, tries to lighten the mood that has settled in the room. "What's the matter? Empress Celene kicking us out?" When she doesn't laugh, he frowns. "Can't get a late check-out?"

"They found Hawke, and we need to leave!" She blurts out before shrinking into herself.

Varric feels his heart collapse, a wind howling in his ears. "Well," he says weakly. "Let's go."


	26. XXVI: Rebirth

"I heard that she tore her way through a fade rift. Wearing nothing but a string of demon claws around her neck."

"Well, _I_ heard that she killed an entire group of scouts. And that it took twenty of the Commander's soldiers to take her down."

Varric rubs his temples, listening to the two fresh recruits gossip right outside of Hawke's door. " _I_ heard that there are two mouthy scouts who are looking for an arrow to the face." He says darkly.

They pale, muttering apologies as they skitter past him. Varric supposes that he can't blame them. The rumors had been flying for weeks now. Hawke singlehandedly clawing her way through the Fade, killing every demon unfortunate enough to get in her way, tearing through rifts like tissue paper. But anyone who had been in the Western Approach that night knew different. When they had arrived from Halamshiral almost a week later, the Scouts still hadn't managed to get her to stop screaming. They told Sparky that they had been sent to mark the location of another rift, a fresh one that had opened up somewhere outside of what used to be Adamant.

 _"The howling," the scout says, his face pale. "We thought it was one of those terrors. It was the same kind of shriek that makes your blood run cold. But when we got there, we found Serah Hawke lying in the sand." He swallows hard, averting Varric's eyes. "Or what was left of her, at least."_

 _His partner nods. "They're still trying to bring her back to camp. She won't let anyone get close enough to touch her."_

 _"You're telling me you people just left her out there?" Varric can't believe what he's hearing. "Maker's breath, she'll die of exposure! What were you thinking?"_

 _"She's like a beast, s-sir." The first scout stammers. "W-we can't get anywhere near her."_

 _He lets out a squeak as Varric advances, grabbing him roughly by the front of his cowl. "Where is she? Take me to her, you nug-humping –"_

 _"Varric, that's enough!" Sparky pulls him off of the scout, holding him by the shoulders. "We'll find her, okay?" She stares down at him intensely, and for the first time, Varric notices the bags under her eyes. "We'll find her." She turns to the scout, pulling her map of the Approach out from her pack. "I need you to mark down where she is."_

 _They travel to the rift in silence, the air around them heavy. Before Varric can ask Sparky how much farther, he hears it. Screaming. Screaming that takes him back to the Deep Roads, Hawke lying face down on the stone, her bloody fists pummeling the ground. Screaming that rattles inside of his head, watching helplessly as she holds onto her mother's corpse, her face contorted in a mask of pain. Screaming that wakes him up in the middle of the night, her face wet with tears, her brother's name on her lips. He hears Hawke screaming before he sees her, and for a moment he fears he might be sick._

 _If only the screaming had been the worst of it._

 _The scouts had been right in saying that they couldn't get close, and they stand in a solemn perimeter around the edges of the rift. He sees a huddled mass of quivering flesh lying in the sand, howling wildly. Varric's stomach churns and he asks a question that he isn't sure he wants the answer to. "Is that," his voice trembles. "Is that_ Hawke _?"_

 _She is curled on her side, her arms wrapped protectively around her body. Her skin is burned, the kind of acid burns that leave the flesh molted and eaten away. He can see the areas where it has been worn down to the bone, her joints jutting out like one of the more grotesque corpses seen on their travels. They stand in a mystified horror, watching this macabre rebirth unfold before their eyes. Finally, after what feels like an eternity, Varric snaps into action. Dropping his pack to the ground, he fishes through it for the blanket from his bedroll. "Sparky," his voice is rough in his own ears. "You need to close that rift. I'm getting her out of here."_

 _"Are you_ mad _?" Dorian exclaims from her side. "You heard the scout back there. She'll tear you in two!" He gestures. "I'm no healer, but I've seen corpses more manageable than that."_

 _Sparky shuffles uncomfortably from one foot to the other. "Dorian is right, Varric. I mean, she almost killed you in Crestwood, and that was_ before _she had crazy Fade strength. I don't know," she trails off, wincing at the dark look he gives her. Turning to Dorian, she frowns. "I suppose it wouldn't be the craziest thing we've done. How is your field healing?"_

 _He sighs. "Mediocre at best, but I'll give it a go."_

 _Varric doesn't wait for a plan, doesn't think as he throws the blanket over his shoulder and charges through the line of scouts. Hawke's screaming rattles him more and more the closer he gets, combining with the crackling of the closing rift above their heads. "Io!" He drops down to his knees in the sand beside her, rolling her onto her back as gently as he can. "Io, it's me!"_

 _She swings at him wildly, her wriggling driving more sand into her wounds. Her eyes are wide, blinking at him unseeingly, flooded with a horror the likes of which he has never seen before. The others approach cautiously, and Varric barks a command over his shoulder. "Seeker, I need you to hold her arms."_

 _With the threat of anymore painful blows neutralized, Varric cups her face, trying to hold her wild stare. "Hawke, Io, it's me. It's Varric. Can you hear me?" She fights his grip, but he holds on. "It's Varric," he repeats. He finds some relief when her screaming grows quieter, turning into an uneven stream of ragged breaths. He sees her limbs loosen in Cassandra's grasp, and for a minute he fears that she might be dying before their eyes._

 _But her eyes begin to slide into focus – still trembling within their sockets, but a loose focus nonetheless. "It's Varric," he repeats hoarsely, stroking her cheek gently with his thumb. The Seeker steps back, releasing Hawke into his custody. As though wrapping a broken doll, he shrouds her in the blanket, pulling her trembling body tightly into his. She mumbles his name weakly against his neck, her voice hollow and cracked. "I've got you." He rocks her, feeling as though he could start sobbing in relief when he feels her shredded fingertips ghost along the sides of his face. "You're safe. I've got you."_

 _Hawke stares at him, a glint of recognition lurking somewhere in the dark depths of her eyes. "Varric," she rasps. Feebly, she lifts her arms, throwing them around his neck. Her body wracks with sobs, the sound echoing through the Approach. "I'm home!" She cries, clinging to him as tightly as she can manage. "I'm home!"_

Sparky slips out of the room, sinking down onto the floor where Varric has sat since they returned to Skyhold. Her face is drawn, her eyes tired, and she rests her head against the wall. He is afraid to ask. For weeks healers had tended to Hawke, working to repair the damage done both in the Fade and in the Approach. She had been delirious, malnourished, and full of broken bones. It was a wonder that she had survived for as long as she did. They had done what they could in the Approach – enough to ensure that she survived transport back to Skyhold – but she had slipped into a state of unconsciousness, and he had been sitting outside of this room ever since.

"She's going to be fine." Sparky says, staring at her hands. "Fine for what she's been through. The healers weren't able to save her right eye – too much damage – but they managed to fix her up. Good as almost-new." She shakes her head, "On the outside, anyway."

"Is she awake?"

"Not yet. They said it'll be a while. While her body repairs itself." She looks at him. "You can sit with her, you know." When Varric doesn't respond, choosing instead to stare fixedly at his boots, she pats him on the shoulder wordlessly before getting up and walking down the corridor.

He can't admit that he is afraid. Afraid to walk into the room and see a shell of who Hawke was, staring at him with the same hollow eyes as Bartrand had. Afraid that she was somehow here and not here all at once, a stagnant reminder of all his misdeeds and empty words. A physical embodiment of his emotional failure. Varric stares at the closed door, thinking until he makes himself sick with worry.

He clambers to his feet and walks away.


	27. Chapter 27

**NOT DEAD, JUST MOVED**

Hi all! This is my formal resignation from . I post all updates on ao3, under the name kingcaboodle, so please, please, please follow these fics (and more) over there!


End file.
